ON THE NATURE OF BONDAGE
the train that runs over a dog
if performative, objection is to the binary choice
with no pants on
I am Its
blood simple
shave my head and leave the foot
petty war beast
to quote: I mean to be a terror to the world
is this a goddamn revelation of self, or what
in all things
recognize falsehood:
I haven’t bothered to crack that one yet
on the wall is hung a man
reaching over your living head
I am here, if I must, to suffer
//let me step in front of me
//let me take my bullet
//let me love unremittingly myself
//let me unlock my own potential
//let me fail myself
//let me know my true nature
//let me be there when I die
a cheater
lying on my belly in their St. Augustine
forgive me, forgive me
for death so that he knows I’m thinking of him
I’m not out here listening forlornly to birds
it’s like my vagina penis can’t get enough
I mean it’s everywhere all the time
—the bloom of knowledge that follows—
I needed to lie and to grieve the lie as well
selfish sex can be the only contract
do I lie? or
stiff marble
the sick source of all desire
( ) oh of
( ) oh clean fork
( ) oh no
raw possession
what a disappointment I could not
more readily
contract a way to measure myself
my harness, but publicly instead
satisfying diminishment, as I’d expect
( ) oh clean fork oh split halved oh come came oh bright thread
( ) oh sacred thigh oh swish oh swi— oh laundry basket
( ) oh meat of sickness oh irritating bystander
my unending desire for your unending desire for me
dear satellite
divorced in the meantime absolution of the royal we
I am not who I thought I was
any other significancy
specifically the raw meat stage
like every time you orgasm, the animal is skinned
lick frosting deep in each other’s eyes
the nature of bondage changes
to who one really is
birthing babies others rescue off the ground
—we can end this now—
open weeping can appear to be
a virus gone systemic
hold me under
the beetle’s language is tongue and groove
the boring beyond:
//a family portrait of me
//falsely accusing myself
//in the night I will come for me
//let me give to me more than I receive
//let me donate my kidney to me
in the presence of ripened nectarine
tongue softly in the dirt
I leave trifles around the house
my own edification
of fucking someone
an embarrassment of riches
as if I could feed a waiting crowd
I wanted you to tell me what you wanted
to know the truth before it is plain
( ) oh pearled body
( ) oh none
( ) oh bright thread
I kept expecting it to get better
suck you into me
provide you into providing me
fair bleaching weather exposure // pregnant—only the early stages
( ) oh tongue of sadness oh of oh licked asshole oh none
( ) oh meat bird oh weekend traveler oh time turned
coarse whine an elaborate
think about fucking you all day long think about
rutting dogs on an endless loop weapon of safety
brick upon hard noise
halfmehalvemehaveme
you love, one you know
I’ll get what I want
reframing my weakening into faultlessness
panicked, lowing
skate through the intersection without looking
I know enough theory
love
teeth snapping at my soft under arm
a dull degradation: the self as sole witness
//let me find the happiness I so richly deserve
//let me pay my own bills
//let me deeply grieve the absence of me
the story told for infinity
sex is not about sex
I imagine encountering one would
when I say no one is talking about the grief
the moment between the fist lands
would happen so and so
rose haze
( ) oh forked pearl of sickness
( ) oh split halved
anal is, a priori, useful
so you could feel
where the phantasy enacts
a shadow birthed and eaten
( ) oh boulders of empathy oh bright tongue oh stroke
—only what is in front of me is what I admire in you—
my gaping thinning
train that is the only way to orgasm, killing an animal
let’s eat cupcakes at each other
the air in that!
before my mother hoofs can stomp them
all things
with a bit of leather between my teeth
against your herky bladework
//let me be the lover of my dreams
//where I am the center of my universe
//in the dark about my own motivations
it is the smell I recognize
which set in motion some complex emotions for death, too
the relief of uncoupling too obvious
to suckle the child—to feel my body multiply
new—reliable only in newness
( ) oh tongue of sadness
teeth in to the gums
more resistance
small thing like the sun
( ) oh dull brightness oh bright fade oh fate oh hum hum hum
my cock all day abandonment is the false positive
let my strength carry you
the first few days together
buy gold chains off the internet without breaking gaze
to be certain I am
raise me up so I can see
like a beetle’s curl and splay
//let it be me
//let me meditate on myself
//watching me when I sleep
no one stops getting hungry
hackles become a form of welcoming
then I knew I didn’t want it after all
pattern, completed replication
( ) oh no
the fool’s construct:
( ) oh pearled fork oh no oh no oh turned signal oh turn
( ) oh laundered extinction oh halved oh sacred brine
to unsatisfactory margins
or even a stranger, killing a stranger dog
just standing there
a house, cursed, is a distraction
depinioned, what will you do now, O man?
//it wasn’t mine to have
one day when I leave the house
in usefulness, use should be pronounced
you said sculptor that you are what
( ) oh sick pearl
I wouldn’t bleed
how simple it is to wait forever
your no a secular investment in holiness
I don’t believe myself I believe
to resign oneself
should be denied agency
//let it center on me
//contractually obligated to me
this murderous anonymity
do I lie?
so
( ) oh pearled body oh sick pearl oh forked pearl of sickness
I’ve smeared blood on Mondrian
dominion has taken me
whose arms and legs
//let me pick me out of a lineup of me
with a hard and slippery ‘zz’ sound
the accident of age
against celebrity
asking can you feel soft reduction, the measurement of which
I am sweetly drunk and dewy
beside—how one does with others
struck, the stone carries its mark
( ) oh licked asshole
( ) oh clean street oh split fork oh facile ending oh slop
we are missing the point of the dilemma
//it all comes down to me
I wanted to grieve the way I wanted to fuck
( ) oh straight shift oh extinct clam oh irritant oh street
waiting
out into the neighbor’s field
( ) oh pearled fork
every day the loop of isolation tightens
the truth is, the truth is too simple for what happened
—gather around me, fathers—
( ) oh come came
by this I mean how we act
is more exciting that way in your hand the real thing
//I should be ashamed of myself
site of entry to constricted certainty
let me drip the self miserly
Amie Zimmerman is from Portland, OR. Her work has been published, or is forthcoming, in Denver Quarterly, Annulet, Lana Turner, Prelude, and mercury firs, among others. She is the author of four chapbooks, including Compliance (Essay Press) and, with artist Samantha Wall, the collaboration 31 Days/The Self (Ursus Americanus). Currently, Amie lives in upstate NY, where she works as a hairstylist, labor organizer, and PhD student. Alongside Hajar Hussaini and Matthew Klane, she curates the poetry and performance series Salon Salvage.