THE 'HOT SWEET Chocolate Showcase' which took place on Saturday night at Hedonism III in Runaway Bay, was not about food.
Despite the fact that the dessert spread for the grand gala dinner was replete with chocolate treats, often topped by grapes and strawberries, the chocolate in mind was more of the fleshy, than fruity kind ... literally speaking. The evening would be a celebration of sensual poetry.
After the guests had therefore sated their desire for food, they gathered around the main stage for the food of love, in this case poetry. The stage and the area just before it had been decorated by several lit candles, the only light source. The usual red curtains for the stage area only served to enhance the atmosphere, a scene of light and shadow. The perfect setting for sensual exploration.
Five local poets had made their way down to the hotel to be a part of the weekend of poetry, which was dedicated to the senses and sensuality - with a sprinkling of raw sex. The poets who added the poetic flair to the weekend were Gina Rey Forest, Connie Bell, Glen Laughton, Duane Francis and Rodney Campbell, and all, except Laughton, performed on Saturday night's show, the premiere event for the weekend.
The evening's host, Glynis Salmon, helped to make the evening even more diverse by reading erotic poetry from literature's greatest, and possibly bawdiest, minds. Her selections came from Shakespeare, Dryden and Alexander Pope. The audience had no problem seeing beyond the language of the verses and applauded enthusiastically her selections. She also gave a taste of her own writings, ending the evening with one of her own teasing poems.
Although they all shared sensuality in their poetry (none of them explored the truly lewd) each of the poets brought a very different flavour. Connie Bell helped to distinguish herself with the use of her fabulous singing voice, which quite enhances the texture of her poetry. Her mixture of the blues with her lyrics usually goes over very well. Saturday night was no different. This was clearly indicated in the crowd's reaction to her first piece 'Quieted By the Moon'.
The response to Bell's poetry generally described the guest's reaction to the evening's poetry. They responded enthusiastically to the words. Francis, who performed three poems, was overwhelmingly received. He performed 'So Fine', Honi Drippa' and 'I Need Some Love'. His lyrics went over equally well with the men and the women. While the women basked in the compliments given, the men seemed to be filled with back-slapping admiration for his ability to 'lyrics'. A few may even have been taking notes.
Gina Rey Forest, who was also using the weekend to promote her self-published book Hot Sweet Chocolate: A Celebration of Love and Desire also gave a stellar performance. Her performance came in two parts, wherein she delivered 'Temptation', 'The Siege', 'More', 'Esorotica', 'Declaration' and 'Flashbacks'. For her delivery of 'Temptation' which includes the line Temptation is a motherflower which is used as a refrain, she used a live prop. As she explained how tempted she was by a very sexy man, she used exotic dancer Hypnotize as a part of her demonstration. The combination of words and the 'hunky' visual aid certainly made its mark.
A rather dapper Rodney Campbell performed a single poem, which he later revealed that he had made up on the spot. Nonetheless, the poem, 'I Am the Man', went over very well with the audience. It was aided by his interactive performance wherein he spoke his lines directly to a female guest, who was quite involved in his performance. She even managed to sneak in a feel just before he walked off.
Poetry was not all the evening had to offer. To put the true Hedonism stamp on the event, the package also featured two of the DC Young Guns exotic male dancers, the aforementioned Hypnotize and the Assassin. Both men stripped down to the full monty and sent the women in the audience wild. Unfortunately, there were no strippers for the men.
