Shamhat’s role has been variously translated as “temple harlot”, “cultic prostitute”, and “priestly courtesan”. None of these quite convey the sacred power and holy awe of a women such as her. She engaged in ritual sex in sacred spaces with droves of people, giving them ecstatic glimpses of the divine. A respected and feared locus of the sacred and erotic.
This poem tries to articulate some of this grandeur in describing her role as gathering the young men of the city’s potent first seed by taking their virginity on their twentieth birthday. The ritual aims to ensure the hungry fertility goddess, Ishtar, the One that keeps the world fertile, gets the young men’s primary insemination herself.
three years now
she has counted
each bobbing sack
emptied
drained into her palms
burst upon her breasts
splashed across her cheek
all seed gathered
to feed the desparate
gaping mouth above
these virgin men
popped like blueberries
or bust open like grapes
they would spurt and cry
in the temple hall
the clay-faced elders
watching erect and awed
would softly applaud
from the shadows