=A Successful Therapy=

(for H)
How was this woman

going to understand

me I complained

about abusive relationships

but excitedly described how

turned on I got

when this one guy tied

my hands behind my

back and pissed in

my face. Well she’s a

therapist I told myself

she’s heard worse so

let me go further I told

her about my fantasies

of being raped and murdered

masturbating in the woods

as a child in the attitude

of girls found dead

in serial killer movies

thrilled by the idea

some guy hiking through

would spot me lying

disheveled in the dank 

leaf-bed and then what but

it never happened

what did is this one guy

had me take off my stockings

hand them to him

and turn with my back

to him and I thought,

this is it he just might

strangle me tonight and I

didn’t object I never said no

to anything they wanted

it’s like I’m too embarrassed

to embarrass him whoever him

might be just like I was

with daddy saying no not in the

vocab too scared to too

and I got super wet instead

why lie waiting to see what

might happen, the tv

was on, muted, tuned to

Chopped: Redemption

the ingredients laid out

like body parts in front of each

contestant cheese and fruit

and chunks of meat unrecognizable

and he didn’t strangle me

obviously only used the stocking

to gag me but none of this

is actually the problem

the problem is this

need to be metaphorically

abused ends up leaking

into real life relationships

that aren’t at all sexual

and this need of mine

broadcasts itself seduces

all the wrong kinds of

abusers by wrong kind I

mean those who sublimate

their sadism into everyday

life. I’m like a lighthouse

calling the wrong ships

to harbor all the cutthroat

pirates so its hopeless, you

see, solitude is the only

prophylactic I can trust

a nun in my tower.

What you need, she said

is to find a non-toxic

dominant who’ll leave

the whip and chains in

the bedroom and care

about you as a person

not take advantage of

your need to be taken

advantage of do you think

such a person exists, I ask,

not believing it for a

moment, a fairy-tale 

as far as I was concerned

I know they do she says 

but how do I that’s something 

I can't tell you, she says then

how can I that’s what

we’re here to find out

and for this I paid,

I think, ninety-five

dollars, and it was good

advice, she was right, but

I didn’t find what I was

looking for in that office

on 15th street but years

and quite a few men later

on Craigslist where I’d

placed an ad so what I’m

saying to you now is

you never know what

maybe she opened my eyes

to recognize it when it

finally came through the door

that night behind its

hard-on or maybe I was just

damn lucky not to be

carried out of that apartment

the next morning
in a bodybag.