Two short pieces sit side by side here, and the title ties them together. "Carnal knowledge" usually means sex, but it also hints at knowing something through the body. The first part is quietly funny: in bed, the speaker wants to perform, and then they do. The repetition makes it sound almost like a task being carried out, as if desire turns into a kind of acting, with a hint of self-consciousness about it.
The second part moves from the bed to a book. The speaker enters it the way one enters a room, or a body, and what they find is "a rough draft of my mind." Reading becomes a way of meeting yourself, unfinished and messy. The poem seems to suggest that both intimacy and reading are forms of knowing, and both can reveal how unpolished we are. The mood is wry, honest, and a little exposed, with a light, thoughtful tone rather than a heated one.