Love comforteth like sunshine after rain

But lust’s effect is tempest after sun

Love’s gentle spring doth always fresh remain

Lust’s winter covers ere summer half be done

Love surfeits not, lust like a glutton dies

Love is all truth, lust full of forged lies.

— Shakespeare

Based on that quote above, lust seems to come second in the contest, with love triumphing. Nevertheless, there is the age-old question: Is it lust or is it love that people feel? So far, very few people have been able to tell the difference between the two, as both are intense, volatile, burning, volcanic, smouldering feelings that often drive people out of their minds.

Not only that, but they are both masters of disguise, mimicking each other in the same way the octopus and the chameleon can disguise themselves by changing colours and masking their presence. Such is the illusion of lust and love.

Lust, borne from a rampaging libido, has dominated the psyche of many people, so much so that it often drives them crazy and is akin to a type of madness. But then again, so does love. But it’s by no means new and has been chronicled for centuries. In fact, it was one of those great writers and philosophers, Socrates or Plato, who wrote, “The male libido is like being chained to a madman. To have a penis is to be chained to a madman.”

Now that’s really a hot and heavy statement, especially from so long ago when those famous philosophers were putting pencil to parchment and papyrus, quills to scrolls, chalk tips to tablets. Who would have thought that they penned such purple penile pointing prose?

But they did, for lust and love are paramount in the hearts and minds of people, and also in the loins. Or is it? Let’s probe that issue right after these responses to what I had to say about ‘Triangle perspective’.

Hi Tony,

I would imagine that should countries be surveyed as to sexual triangular practices, Jamaica would come out on top as the lead country. It seems that it is common practice, especially with married men having a woman or two on the side. As you said, the practice often leads to ruin. The only threesome I would consider is where all parties are single and the sex is merely recreational and open.

Peter

Hello Tony,

One thing is true, the hypocrisy of the love triangle permeates our society. There are so many threesomes embedded in our people that we could be described as a geometric wonder. The hypocrisy is that no one admits to it, and even those who aren’t involved in one side of the triangle wish that they were a part of those angles. Some are in triangles, while others wish that they were, and that’s the hypocrisy.

Dianne

Sometimes people feel a strong burning sensation for each other that they often mistake for love, when, in reality, it’s lust, just like that which animals feel when they are in heat. But nothing is wrong with lust for, after all, lust is what got us here, lust is the driving force behind procreation and perpetuates the species. Take away lust and mankind ceases to exist.

If one person doesn’t feel that itch, that burning desire for the other that has to be quenched, then there will be no baby coming forth from those loins. With all the love in the world, if lust isn’t there, then all is lost.

Perhaps, though, just perhaps, lust is a male prerogative, while love belongs to the domain of the female. At least that’s what some people would like us to believe. Think about it though, when have you ever heard a man express love for a woman upon first seeing her?

Instead, he gushes about how sexy she looks and how his loins ache and what he wants to do with her. Remember the song by General Degree, “You think it a go go so when ah hold you tonight, I goin do all of the things weh yuh like.” There’s always the threat, real or imagined, of aggressive sexual activity, all born from lingering lust that leaps from the loins.

The male aches with desire, and no wonder those famous, ancient scribes wrote that the man’s libido is like being chained to a madman. That’s because a man with a powerful libido is like a crazed, raging bull, and literally can’t help himself or his actions as his penis is his driving force.

“I just can’t help it, it’s like it has a mind of its own.”

So many men have been caught up in the throes of passion fuelled by lust and simply cannot stop, even if the woman asks him to. There are no brakes powerful enough to stop that force.

Now, some of you may scoff in disbelief and say, “Nonsense, exercise some self-control.” But easier said than done. If you haven’t got a strong libido, driven by lust, you just wouldn’t understand. As the late comedian Bernie Mac used to say, “You don’t understand, you just don’t understand.”

It’s often a man’s gift, but it can also be a curse for those who can’t contain their urges, their burning lust, who are truly chained to a madman that, although smaller than them, is infinitely more powerful.

“It’s driving me crazy, I am going stark staring mad with this burning lust in my loins all the time, I cannot eat, I cannot sleep.”

Is that, perchance, what male sex addicts feel, or nymphomaniacs? I won’t even go that far, for even people not so afflicted do have powerful lusty feelings. And it begins early. Just recently a lady called me to ask if I believed that a 13-year-old boy could commit rape. In her mind, a boy that age would not be capable of such an act as his sexuality would not be developed.

I quickly set her straight and recited the stats that the average age for initial sexual activity in Jamaica for boys is 14-15 years old, with some starting even earlier. Lust begins very early and is alive and well.

Naturally, there are exceptions, and some do not have these feelings, but they exist in the majority of healthy people. Pity the man who does not possess lust but marries a woman who does, and pity even more the man who is imbued with a powerful lust but marries a woman who has none.

Men fall in lust, but women fall in love. So the man feels these urges and the woman misconstrues them for love. Can you just imagine if it was the other way around, with women leering and lusting after men, while the men swoon and fall in love?

But do women lust too, do they also have burning desires in their loins and have raging fires that they have to quench? If they do, they certainly can contain it. If not, they’ll be frowned on by society, so they better choose love as an expression and not lust.

“Sex is the consolation you have when you can’t have love,” says Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

“If they substituted the word ‘lust’ for ‘love’ in the popular songs, it would come nearer the truth,” said Sylvia Plath.

“He looked good like sin in a suit,” said Melissa Mark.

“I feel like an animal, and animals don’t know sin, do they?” — Jess C Scott.

So it does appear that women do experience lust, too, and do have raging libidos, but have considerably more self-control than men. What happens when the woman is filled with an insatiable lust but the man is not? Is that what the Bible meant when it referred to being unequally yoked?

Even if it didn’t mean that, it should, for that scenario spells disaster. Very few men can handle a woman who lusts all the time. It may be fine at first, but after a while he simply cannot keep up. Plus, there’s the factor of diminishing returns, where less pleasure is gotten from a task if it’s done too often.

It’s not quite the same if the man constantly lusts, but she only loves, for at least she can fake it and pretend to enjoy it. Remember the old saying, “Men feign love to get sex, while women feign sex to get love.” Wait a minute, is everybody faking it, does no one show their true colours?

The man wryly tells her that he loves her because he wants sex, and she slyly gives him sex because she wants love. What a complicated conundrum in which men and women find themselves entangled.

What it really boils down to is that lust and love go hand in hand, are basically two sides of the same coin, and you can’t have one without the other. Men lust but say that they love, women love but pretend to lust, while others are blessed or cursed with both lust and love. Just take it as it comes and enjoy the ride.

More time.

seido1yard@gmail.com

Footnote: It’s always been said that the law applies to two sets of people in Jamaica. The night noise law seems to apply here. The residents of New Kingston are catching hell from the unbearable thunderous noises coming from the numerous functions held in residential New Kingston. These occur almost all week, with the noise blaring until 3 to 4 o’clock in the morning. The hapless residents are at their wits’ end, and despite numerous meetings with the police, councillors from both political parties, the mayor and others, the nightly barrage continues. And yet the police will raid and lock down parties in the inner cities where the people actually welcome those activities. Where is the parity and justice?