16
Where a Masochist Goes
Close your eyes.
The rolling waves crash
over white sands and you are at peace…
No--
I sit in a wooden chair in the middle of a room.
My arms are bound at the sides
by silk scarves knotted at the wrists.
Each neuron in the air jostles around me.
The black velvet strip of fabric tied
around my eyes
hangs past my nose, sways when I
inhale, tickling the top of my lip.
You won’t understand this.
My body is a singing bowl.
The singularity of space here
is an olive branch.
Nothing else exists
but this promise of stable land.
I cock my head towards the footsteps circling me,
rub the side of my face against
a forearm suspended there.
I trust the warm body orbiting me
as if we’d made an oath
sacred as any church vow.
My pores breath as if they have been starved years for air.
Each tiny hair is a tuning fork
measuring the precise pitch of this moment.
My patent heels read the ground beneath
naked as bare feet in pilgrimage on holy sands
to some shrine.
This is my Mecca, my church,
my ancient temple built high and rooted deep.