Pornographer’s Dream
Rants, Raves and Reviews, Scenology — By Adele on 27 June, 2007 8:27 pmI was listening to Suzanne Vega’s new album Beauty & Crime, and there I found a song that just waited to be blogged.
Pornographer’s Dream
She’s a pornographer’s dream, he said.
I knew what he meant.
But it made me imagine: what kind of a dream
He would have, that hadn’t been spent?Would he still dream of the thigh? of the flesh upon high?
What he saw so much of?
Wouldn’t he dream of the thing that he never
Could quite get the touch of?It’s out of his hands, over his head
Out of his reach, under this real life
Hidden in veils, covered in silk
He’s dreaming of what might beBettie Page is still the rage
With her legs and leather;
She turns to tease the camera, and please us at home,
And we let her.Who’s to know what she’ll show of herself,
In what measure?
If what she reveals, or what she conceals,
Is the key to our pleasure?It’s out of our hands, over our heads
Out of our reach, under this real life
Hidden in veils, covered in silk
We’re dreaming of what might be
Apart from the fact that I would argue that the described delectable picture is a dream more likely to belong to a porn-viewer’s than a pornographer… I just love that Suzanne Vega seems to think that Bettie Page is the stuff of dreams, everything that’s right with the world of porn.
Honestly, though? Pornographers don’t, on the whole, dream of the models. At least, I don’t think they do. An enthusiast may dream of the perfect picture or movie, an enterpreneur is more likely to dream of fields heaps of gold or whatever. I guess, a model can be the subject of dreams if she’s better than anybody at making that perfect movie or great success come about.
Do mainstream film-makers dream of electric sheep actors as objects of wonder in themselves? (Unless they’re Quentin Tarantino, and have a fetish for Uma Thurman’s feet?)
Still love the song, though.
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3 Comments
Great! I have this CD too and am playing it a lot right now.
I’m reading Laura Nyro’s bio “Soul Picnic – The Music and Passion of Laura Nyro” which talks about the Greenwich Village influence that shape music in a big way. Janis Ian was another, I love “Between the Lines” that i just bought yesterday! Suzanne Vega wrote this tribute to Laura Nyro in the book – “She wrote about the world I lived in but infused it with so much passion that ordinary things – the weather, the river, the streets, the kids – glowed with a spiritual energy. Though we were plain, ordinary nasty kids, when she sang she made us beautiful”.
Interesting that SV has tracks “Bound” and “Unbound” on this CD, having previously written “Ironbound” for Solitude Standing album…”Bound up in wire and fate, watching her walk him up to the gate, in front of the ironbound school yard” :)
Emma
x
“A Pornographer’s Dream” – stretching the definition a bit, is not anyone a pornographer who fantasises about sex, imagines various sexual situations, however spontaneously or deliberately? I’m unsure what Suzanne Vega means in this lyric – is it that all sexually active (if only imaginatively) people are in constant search of the best experience, or those which most resemble it, or their idea of it? She could be casting doubt, or even mockery, on the very idea of pornography – but that seems to doubt/mock sexual imagination and curiosity. A good lyric/poem anyway, ambiguity and all.
Emma – that’s a great line, about making “plain, nasty” kids beautiful through lyrics. Sends shivers down my spine…
Will – I’d love to know what she means. :) However, I like to to think that she simply finds understatement and the promise of sexy things more erotic than the full-on bump-and-grind. (Which happens to be my attitude towards erotica as well.)