Skin in me

Journaling is an act of autoerotic evisceration
Spilling my guts for my own pleasure
And stamping around in the juices like a toddler in a puddle
My promethean navel barely heals by the morning
It weeps serous fluid and soaks my sheets
Meaning I always wake up to a damp shirt and pants

The first time I slept with my girlfriend I was nervous about it
Just so you know I said just like,
It’s not like, me pissing the bed or something, but it’s okay if you’d rather sleep separately
She laughed
Oh believe me, compared to some of the shit I’ve seen, that’s nothing
I asked what kind of shit she’s seen
Oh, crazy shit

Each time the hole opens easier
It doesn’t heal over entirely
And it hurts when I button up the business casual shirt
That I wear for the ministry of whatever the fuck
Making it the itchiest pall an ambulant corpse ever wore
Like, even christ sat still for three days and that was in 1st century linen
Which I guarantee had ticks in it or fleas or something

At 10.20am I get restless sitting in the open plan
My guts are wrestling for the exit, snakes in a mating knot
Or whatever the opposite is
Where instead of having sex they want to get as far away from each other as possible
I walk hop jog to the restroom, cellphone, notes app,
And slit my belly for the relief

I can’t stop/can’t keep on opening up
So I wonder where I’m going with this, topologically,
There’s only so many openings in the human body
So extrapolate:
I’ll end up a healthy blood eagle
Quartered but thriving
Maybe my giblets will grow calluses
Blood will split and scab
And I’ll finally be all outsides
Meanwhile instead of a heart
There’ll be skin in me

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David Bowers-Mason is a Wellington-based writer. Though originally from Putaaruru in the South Waikato, he felt called to grey life working in a public sector cubicle, and moved to Wellington to pursue that dream. He takes inspiration from Junji Ito, Becky Chambers and other authors of weird fiction.