John Updikes poems are written in a very peculiar style. Unlike most poets, Updikes poems seem to tell a story, rather than depict a singular emotion. This is due to the fact that many of Updikes poems deal with simple, yet focused topics. Updike masters the use of vivid language to produce powerful images in the minds of his readers. The use of such strong language in his poems allow his readers to see and experience the messages which he is portraying. Although the topics of Updikes poems vary immensely, the same detailed conceptions are evoked from every poem. One poem that stands out, among his sexual pieces, is Fellatio. Unlike intercourse, fellatio has been depicted throughout history as an unclean and unacceptable practice. In Updikes poem, Fellatio, he initially gives this sexual act a completely different characterization. Updike writes, How beautiful to think / that each of these clean secretaries / at night, to please her lover, takes / a fountain into her mouth... (p. 49). Although the act of oral sex is widely practiced today, I have never heard it depicted as a beautiful act. The sense of beauty comes from the idea that the woman and her lover share a bond so deep that she is willing to do anything to please him. Updike later portrays this act as very natural, because he goes on to compare the culmination of oral sex to nature in the end of this poem. The act is compared to the planting of flowers in a field, or the beautiful, clean, innocent clouds in the sky. This poem was very shocking to me, because it gave this act such innocent, natural connotations, when you first read it. Updike, however, has added a subtle element of humor to this poem. This element of humor depicts the speakers true feelings about this act. The line in which the speaker says How beautiful, is clearly sarcastic. It also seem to imply that there is comedic value to the idea that these women, who appear so clean cut and proper ...
