(Several) women ask me why I carry so many condoms in my pockets.
All I can say is:
It’s to make up for all the times I gave up on my body and ignored the need for protection.
The bad ones said:
I’m allergic
or
It’s just not the same with a rubber on
or
You’ll enjoy it so much more when skin is or tongue is or hard-on is against/inside skin
I want to feel the wrath of security
I want you to want to protect me
I want me to want to protect me
[My body grew rust
a machine without identity or negatives]
Ask me about control, how I perceive men now,
why I lock my doors and cunt at night
and padlock my thighs together
\
Then,
I woke up and spoke the most dangerous parts of me.
(I prefer sex when no one else is involved)
and you still want to touch this?
you ask
why
I ask
how
*
I sucked on soap and tinctures long enough to
un stain this body
just don’t look too long
(OK?)
for you,
I swallow latex
fifteen hundred pounds of condoms and dental dams
consume controlled pills of birth and un-tighten my vagina to fit seven diaphragms,
small rubber domes tailored for my tightness
I got a security helmet for my cervix
good for forty-eight hours
gutted a lamb to steal its intestines
so my body can broadcast its warmth and demonstrate sensations safely
my lips have been smeared with bleach to ensure you of their sterility
{ I exist/ how I want/ to exist/ now}
*
I counted two hundred and seventeen stars in the sky last night.
I may have lost count or
counted some twice,
but I wished on all of them anyway.
I wished for my flesh to peel like snake skin,
allowing cells a chance to start over.
I wished for an industrial-sized-titanium lock
to permanently block all entrances on my body
so no one could ever get in again.
I wished for love or
a translation of it.
Or the ability to allow it
*
I want to believe in magic, but
I always see the bulge beneath sleeves
against zipper strain
\
{Dedicate}
To the woman who does not own high heels.
Does not pace upon black pavement, cold street cornered posts with tall lights illuminating glow of buy-the-hour smile.
Knees high, laced toes.
Latex teeth already lubricated to save time and the awkwardness of asking.
To the woman who takes up space in carved desk chairs,
listening to lectures by dual-degreed professionals as the scent of student loans linger in the air.
To the woman who multi-tasks, splitting up studying time with secret identity of three hundred and fifty dollar eroticism,
with the add on tasks of swallowing childhood traumas.
To the girl who advertises as sexxxyseductress with triple x’s to represent her eagerness.
Painted as a GFE provider, specializing in DATY.
Stimulating senses no longer saved for special occasion.
To the woman shaking an extra sweet-n-low in her morning coffee,
creating that extra jolt of caffeine to get her through the day.
*
I am in this world and I am a feminist. Trying to be a humanist. Practicing to be human.
Believing in the secured rights and opportunities of all women equal to men.
All women. Loose women. Right-wing women. Left-wing women. Brown women. White women. Whores and high-class women. Homeless women. Welfare-women. Queer women. Transgender women. Pro-choice women.
I am in this world of pornographic mothers with dripping breasts. Trying to afford diapers and compensate for fathers who forgot what sperm can do. These women are not just dope fiends. Not just single parents, placing children in kindercare as they spread legs rented out by the hour to pay for heat and electric bill, not covered by welfare. Not just women of color, poor misused and forgotten statistics. Not just victims of foster care, runaways, victims of abuse, victims of alcoholic fathers who forget about the mothers and choose warm, virgin skin of daughters as secret alternative.
I am in this world full of violence. Prosecution of prostitution, without the education of alternative options.
I am in this world as a citizen. As a voter. As a body/microphone with breaths/poems pushed out.
I can be naked now
A continuance
Translation
Transcendence of
what this body is
now
now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.now.
Aimee Herman 