Aphrodisiacs are the Drag Queens of the Plant World

I'm preparing for the herbal class I'm teaching on Sunday on aphrodisiacs. My hands are smeared with raw honey, raw cocoa powder, rose powder, cayenne, cinnamon, and maca*.  I'm making homemade aphrodisiac infused honey, for spreading on a buttery croissant or....

I started out a bit grumpy.  I have a lot to do.  I have to make an outline for the class so I don't ramble too much, even though I like rambling. I like chatting about medicinal plants like they're people.  I am excited when scientists come back with findings that support the ways people have been working with them for generations.  But science isn't what generally attracts people to aphrodisiacs.  I need to bring out their fun side, without rambling.

I was wondering how I was going to do that, until I tasted my fingers.  All of a sudden I was happy.  Laughing.  I looked at myself in the mirror.  I looked hot.  My lights were on.  Yum.

Aphrodisiacs do have a 'serious' side, in the fact that most of them are also strengthening to the heart, reproductive, and/or nervous systems, many if not all are anti-depressive, and in general they make people feel happy, even giddy, which is very creatively freeing.  They aren't "just" about sex.

What makes me happiest about aphrodisiac plants is that they prove a theory I've always had, something I've always felt.  I wrote poems about it when I was sixteen, railing against, in my sixteen-year-old lingo, 'the priests and the pimps.'   Sexual love is heart opening, expansive, joy bringing, juicy pleasure.  Aphrodisiac plants are living poems to life force.  They support the idea that life is pleasurable.  What a simple, and yet somehow still radical thought.

Rupaul was on WNYC today, on the Leonard Lopate Show, promoting his new book called Workin It: Rupaul's Guide to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Style.  The interview sounded caned, but nevertheless I'm excited to check out the book.  Besides trying to get Leonard to say that he remembered the hookers on 28th Street from the '70s, Rupaul said some interesting things.  One, that we are all born naked and everything else is drag, meaning that we're all wearing a costume.  And two, that Drag Queens in every culture teach us not to take life so seriously.  I believe that drag is a sacred practice.  Drag Queens and Kings are like aphrodisiacs.  They encourage the rest of us (if we're open to them) to feel libidinous, empowered, and playful. 

I like to work hard at the things I love.  I'm often up late writing.  I push myself, sometimes to the point of exhaustion.  Sometimes a well-meaning someone will say, 'lighten up.  Have some fun.  You're working too hard.'  And I'm annoyed.  This advice just points out that I'm rigid, stuck, without giving me a way to get unstuck.  Aphrodisiac plants, like an amazing drag show, do the lightening up for me. They get me to laugh, to open my heart, to feel a little naughty, a little loose, a little more free.  They turn on my lights and make me feel like workin it.

Kate's Ooh la la honey 2010 
(The possibilities are endless.  Use this as a guide and play with your own recipe.)

Raw Honey

Ground rose petals (about 1 part)

Ground Maca* (about 4 parts)

Raw Cocoa powder (about 3 1/2 parts)

Cinnamon Powder (1/4 part)

Cayenne Powder (pinch...to taste. )

*Maca is a supreme aphrodisiac for both men and women.  Its actually a type of dried, ground turnip.  Its also helpful for dealing with stress.  Its fertility enhancing, so be careful if that's not what you want. Its a warming herb, helping the people to deal with the cold in the high Andes mountains of Peru.  If you are someone who is prone to be 'hot'-- you have occasional acne outbreaks, anger easily, etc. , this might not be a great choice on a super regular basis, but I'm one of those types, and find that very occasionally having maca for its aphrodisiac purposes is fine, the way that eating a turnip is fine.  Dried and powdered it tastes a little like pancake batter, and can be substituted for flour and mixed into pancakes.

On a plate, preferably with a lip, mix the powders.  Power the roses with a mortar and pestal.  If you don't have one, you can improvise with a mug and your fingers.  Typically dried rose petals powder fairly easily.  Make sure that you use petals that are meant for internal use, organic if possible.  Commercial fresh roses are covered in toxic chemicals, sadly. 

The measurements are very approximate.  Experiment to taste.   Spoon out a small dollop (about a nickel size) of the honey.  Roll into the powders, forming a ball in your hands.  It will be fairly sticky at first.  The powders will seep into the honey. After the powders have seeped in, roll it in the powders again.  They will seep in more.  Roll them gently one last time, then place in a clean dry jar. Continue to do this until you have filled the jar with powder-infused honey.   (You will see that more has seeped into the honey after time). Put the jar in the oven with the pilot light or another warm location overnight so that the honey and powders fully meld together.  The longer you wait, the more it will infuse, but you can use it right away if the mood strikes you.

You can find the ingredients at your local herb shop.  In NYC that's Flower Power Herbs and Roots on East 9th St., or if you don't have a local shop, here's a link to a good quality mail order place that carries all of these ingredients.

The Lost Tribes of New York City from Carolyn London on Vimeo.

I love animation and NYC street inspiration. This seems to be a riff on Nick Park's brilliant Creature Comforts. If you haven't seen that and like this, check it out.

I live for spontaneous street parties. When I was a kid growing up in the suburbs I would stare out my window into the empty cul de sac, listening to 'Feel the Beat and the Rhythm of the Night...' on the radio, and imagine the quiet dead end street transforming into a giant dance party. I thought that was what New York City must be like all the time.

I'm Still Standin (yeah yeah yeah)

What do I think I’m doing,
staring at a computer screen late at night
watching Elton John cavorting by the sea
with men dressed in rainbow body paint and loin cloths?
This is what it has come to.
This is how I find my inspiration
when it has been set down, casually, on the street outside a taco shop.

You’re not a real poet, she said.
You haven’t attended a poetry workshop at a Seven Sisters school,
or been published recently in a prestigious literary journal.
You haven’t won a Slam or even dared enter one.
You are just like me, she said.
Not-a-poet.

I’ll admit it stung.
My inner sixteen year old,
clutching her pencil,
writing about spiders and death
and the twisted way sex is represented in culture,
buckled her knees and sucked in her breath.

But-- I –will—still—write—a—poem.
I will find my poem inside Elton’s jaunty cap.
His cane comes flying out of the sky
to land in his hand like the wand of a b-movie wizard.
Fawning dancers with their Fosse-for-dummies choreography
jut their hips and snap their wrists;
take synchronized smooch sessions under beach umbrellas;
float their balletic bodies through each others arms across the sand.
How could I have missed this splendor all my life?

I used to be serious.
Loved songs about the apocalypse.
Attended the right protests.
Read the New York Times
but often skipped the arts section
unless there was a review of End Game or Homecoming,
some play about life in a dustbin
or the inherent violence underlying all human exchange.

Now my protests are in the form of ecstatic dances
and peach trees grown with children out of garbage dumps.
I wear pumpkin socks and stretch in frog pajamas.
I read cartoons when the newspaper words swirl and blur.
Swine flu rhymes with Xanadu.
Strategic strike with baby dyke.
Missile defense with swingin gents.
I say things like thank my lucky stars, as I do thank them,
for beaming Sir Elton,
sauntering in a white suit and boater on the Promenade des Anglais,
into my computer when I needed him.
And I don’t care,
not really,
whether I'm a real poet or not.