Katie Condon earned an MFA from the University of Houston and is a doctoral student at the University of Tennessee. Her work has appeared in the anthology Hallelujah for 50ft Women: Poems about Women’s Relationships to Their Bodies. Condon was born in Connecticut and lives in Knoxville, Tennessee.

Praying Naked and Other Poems

by Katie Condon


Praying Naked

I’ve never let a man love me
without feeling very Mary Magdalene about it.

Just the other night I was dancing with a friend
of a friend & he got handsy & I got servant-minded


letting him move his grip from my waist to my hips
& lower, while a Motown bass boomed through the opaque


& sweaty darkness. It wasn’t guilt I felt
when I decided I was obliged to let him


explore the finer points of my swaying
body. Maybe it was loneliness. Maybe


it was my own desire to be desired, since, if a man
wants me, I know I have at least a little worth left.
People on couch
To continue reading please sign in.
Join for free
Already a reader? Sign In