by Michael Gira
I look around me, for something to recognize, to anchor me. I’m in a different room. I don’t know if I remember it. I don’t know how to act. I can’t make a move without wondering why or if I made it.
(1986 / 1994)
BLOODSUCKER
I hear your voice while I’m sleeping. I’m not sure if I’m dreaming, or if you’re standing above me taking advantage of my susceptibility to suggestion. Your thick voice crushes my body. You press me down. I’m sweating, wrapped inside the rubber sheet you seal me into each night. My mind’s weak. I’m incapable of resistance. Your voice covers me in the dark. I wrap it around me like the rubber sheet you use to wrap my body. Your voice invades my body. The heat of your voice warms my body as it weakens it. My skin is your skin.
Your face is hanging over my face, glowing slightly in the dark. You’re disembodied. I’m encased in what feels like fat. I’ve been disemboweled. My throat’s been cut. Beneath the rubber sheet, I’m swimming in my body’s waste. I open my mouth so you can stick your tongue in me. I’m completely yours. As your face covers mine, I feel your knife puncture, then slip into my chest. I’m looking into your eyes, drowned by your strength. Later, bound up in the rubber sheet, hanging by my ankles in the corner, I feel loved, as my blood and refuse fall across my face onto the floor. I’m completely open to you.
You leave me alone in my corner for several hours. The blood drains out of my body. My flesh cools. I’m conscious of myself hanging in the corner, and the sound of laughter in the other room. You’re drunk. When you tell your friend how you finished me off, you choke on your words like a dog chokes on meat. I’m swaying. The floor’s falling away from me. I’m conscious of my flesh being food. I’m aching to be eaten. I want to feel myself slide down into your stomach, the source of your voice. I need your strength.
You’re pulling me against your body. I feel my bones breaking. My back’s bent backwards until it snaps. My neck’s tied to my heels. You’re shaping my body to fit your needs. You’re singing to yourself, soothing me, as you inspect the package you’ve made of my body. I’m inert. I’m yours.
I’ll do anything for you. I don’t exist outside the perimeters of your needs. My body doesn’t exist until it’s violated by your body. I’m unable, unwilling to move, become conscious of myself, without your direction. When your hands aren’t on me, I don’t feel anything. When you fuck me, burying me in the bed, I use your skin to define where I end.
My skin’s rubber. When you claw me, the lacerations you leave behind don’t bleed. My heart’s soft for you. When you suck my eyes, you can taste how I see you. I need you to seal me in, so I won’t think, and lock me away. You’re pulling me into you. I’m gorged, sinking into your belly. I don’t feel myself when I’m inside you. I need you to order my time, my movements, my mind. I don’t feel anything unless you feel it for me. When you claw me, when you penetrate me, when you open up, I feed on your pleasure. I’m empty inside you.
(1984)
A WOMAN
He’s looking down my dress. He can see my breasts. He wants to hurt me, hang me with the noose that’s in his hand. He’s mocking me with it, swinging it in front of my face, showing me that if I go with him, he’ll hang me with it after we fuck. I’m not sure if I want him to hurt me. I know that when he pushes his cock into me it will hurt when it hits my uterus. His cock fills me up and makes me another person, subject to his desire, his violence. He’s going to call his friends over and invite them to gang rape me, then hang me while they masturbate in harmony with my suffering. I’m prey. I’m constantly hunted. I keep my head down, trying to obscure myself, trying to sink into the wall. They always smell me. My ass gives off a scent. I can’t get rid of it. Men smell me. They want to fuck me, obliterate me, once the smell’s reached the nerves inside their heads. They want to fuck me, rip me to shreds. I have to steel myself, be more clever than they are. I use my scent as a lure (a kind of weapon). I lead them to a cliff, then I push them off. As they fall, they can’t believe what’s happened to them. They scream in stupid male agony. They’ve been had. Sometimes they get the better of me. Then I’m tortured, cut, disregarded after being used. Someone’s going to hang me. Some man will follow me and string me up in his shed. He may as well kill himself, because once I’ve been wiped out, I’m of no use to him, and he needs me. He needs my smell in his head. When I die, my smell will shift into decay and choke his desire. His desire is putrid, ugly. Mine’s justified, because my cunt has to be filled. My cunt smells like death, because it was made to choke cocks. I deserve to be hanged, eviscerated, my feet and hands cut off, because I’m a woman. My body should be left to hang in a dark room until it gets ripe, until the smell is physical and solid. When he comes in and puts his hands on me, cuts me down and lays me out on the floor, my corpse mouth will moan for him to fuck me. My smell will press him into my corpse while he fucks me. The words I lick into his ear will kill him slowly while he fucks my body.
(1984)
YOU
My head is between my legs. My back’s bent. I’m limp. I feel myself: I’m a spiral. I enclose myself, then lose myself, then enclose myself again. The air I inhale sedates me as it infests my blood.
I have to stand up. I can’t control my limbs. When I lift my left arm, my right arm falls, pulling the rest of me down with it. My bones are soft. They bend beneath the weight of my body. I have to move. I slide along the floor. I’m a snake. I press my tongue out onto the floor for guidance. I can taste where your feet have been. I look up at you in the other room through the half-open doorway. You’re sitting at your desk talking on the telephone. I slide myself towards you. You notice me, but ignore me. I’m at your feet, looking up the underside of your desk. My hands are between my legs, protecting myself, warming myself. Some words are carved into the pale wood on the underside of the desk: “Get rid of him." I hear the repetitive scratch of the voice in the telephone: “I hate him.” Your voice is soft and thick in response. I can’t define the words. They fall against my skin in slow, deliberate waves. I rest my head on your feet, looking up at you. You reach down, winding a strand of my hair around your finger.
You hang up the telephone. I pull my knees up into my chest, trying to compact myself. My body is a smooth sphere, my genitals exposed, hanging out onto the floor. I hear the faint cracking of your bones as you bend over me, then the warmth of your mouth surrounding my genitals. I’m passive as you feed on me.
You pick me up and throw me over your shoulder. My white liquid is draining from the corners of your mouth. I have no ambition, no fear, no will to live. I’m sucking your breast as you carry me. Your milk bleeds directly down into my stomach. My stomach swells, stretches. I’m pregnant with your milk. I’m drugged.
You lay me out on the bed. I watch your shape pull away from me, preparing the box in the center of the room, tamping the blankets and cushions along the inside walls. I fall asleep.
I wake up inside the box. It’s black inside, a sliver of light entering through a crack in the corner. I reach my hand up to it. The light catches on the knuckles. The rest of the hand is in darkness. It’s not my hand. It doesn’t belong to me. I’m in a separate world. I try to remember where I was before. I can’t. I don’t remember what I feel like outside of this. I’m studying the shape (my knuckles) in the column of light. A finger emerges, a serpent drawing itself out of water. I turn it towards myself. It disappears as I bring it closer to my face. I run it along the skin of my cheek, pressing in to see where I end. I insert it in my mouth, sliding it across the rough surface of my tongue, sucking as I regain consciousness. I feel my face stretching.
I’m gradually aware of two things: a constant low frequency roar, and the steady increase of the temperature inside the box. I close in on myself, pulling my knees up to my chest, pressing my head down in between my knees. The box fills with smoke. I feel my skin burning. I try to cease breathing without losing consciousness. I concentrate on one thought, eliminating everything else from my mind
: you.
(1985)
THE INITIATE
I’m naked, on my hands and knees, crawling down the hallway towards the incinerator. I’m boiling, I’m sweating, the leash around my neck is choking me; I want to burn. My master, the cop, is digging into my back with his steel claws. I feel all five of them. Each claw makes a separate canal in my flesh. He’s holding the leash tight, pulling the choker when I rebel. He’s shouting down at me: “Move, dog! Crawl! Hurt! ...” His big mouth opens wide when he shouts. Stale, heavy gas comes up from his stomach and forms a cloud around my head. His guts smell like bilious hunger. I want to burn, and smell my flesh burning as I burn. The hallway is shifting sideways. When the cop shouts, it knocks against the walls then slams into my head. I can hear my breathing. It’s amplified a hundred times. It’s the breath of a mechanical beast exhaling steam. My breath comes back at me and grinds me into the concrete floor. I stop moving. I’ve lost strength. My arms and legs have collapsed. My head’s resting sideways on the hot concrete, my tongue hanging out of my mouth. My tongue’s swollen, ready to burst. I look up. The cop’s looking down at me, the fire from the incinerator reflected in his eyes. He flicks lightly at my tongue with his boot, smiling, showing mock compassion. I try to pull my tongue back into my mouth so I can form words. I want to apologize, assure him that I’m trying to get up strength. I want to burn. He raises his boot. I feel my tongue smashed into a pulp. The incinerator’s roaring. The cop’s face is deep orange. His shadow on the wall behind him is huge, the arms swinging down onto his head as he beats me. When I wake up, I’m suspended by ropes in front of a mirror. I’m naked. My genitals have been cut away. The word “crawl” has been carved into my chest. I hate my body. I don’t want to look at it. When I try to turn my head away, I can’t: the tendons in my neck have been cut. When I try to close my eyes, I can’t: my eyelids have either been forced open or removed. I hate my mind. I hate my body. I’m trapped staring at my carcass. The sound of my breathing is torture. I try to stop breathing. I can’t. I can’t escape myself. Several policemen come in. They stand around me in a semi-circle, discussing the shape and contours of my flesh. One of them takes a knife from his pocket and carves a slice of meat from my thigh. They pass it around, each one tasting it turn. I’m happy to have them eating me. Eventually I’ll disappear. As I dissipate, they’ll grow stronger. I feel myself pouring into them.
(1984)
THE IDEAL WORKER
At work, I’m dead flesh, waiting to be eaten. I enjoy feeling that way. I want someone else to inhabit my body. I want them to use me. My time, otherwise, is useless. When I'm given a specific task, I’m not punished with my mind, which I despise. I need my superiors because they save me from myself. My only ambition is to become more pliable, more inert. I want my mind to be open to my superiors. I want them to be able to read it at all times. Then they’ll punish me for my involuntary hatreds. If they punish me correctly, they’ll wipe my mind clean. That will feel good.
(1984)
THE WHORE BOY
I’m waiting for someone to ride me. I’m on my hands and knees. My naked ass is sticking up in the air in a roomful of clothed men. Their businessman’s shoes are shined and I can see the distorted reflection on my face as I bend down to lick. I’ve put myself in this position because I enjoy the power I acquire through self-denigration. Once these men think I’m no better than meat, I have the advantage. They drain their sperm into my ass one by one. I enjoy the pain I steal from their pleasure in hurting me. After they’re finished with me, they spit on me, then they dress me and push me out the door. Riding home in the cab, I’m drenched in the smell of my asshole and my sweat. I enjoy the thought of the cab driver smelling it also. When I’m upstairs safe in my apartment, I squat over my frying pan and release their sperm and my shit. I let it simmer over the fire, mixed with wine. As I eat, I play the scene over again in my mind, ingesting each man, one by one.
(1984)
DEFEATED
I’m in the hallway, my hands are hidden. I’m afraid of recognizing myself. The walls reflect me. They know me, think for me, remember for me. I know myself, so I despise myself. I’m unable to forgive myself. I’ll commit murder. I’m capable of a premeditated act of cruelty, torture, just to see what’s it’s like, just to see what I become. The world’s an immediate extension of my thoughts, my self-hatred. I cut myself off.
They’re in the room at the end of the hall, feeding on each other, sucking, sweating into each others’ mouths, penetrating. They’re larvae. They are undulating worms. They’re monsters. I’m insane, I’m inverting myself. I’m twisting like mud between my fingers. I’m malleable, shaped, soft. I’ll kneel here, pressing my face to the damp carpet, and watch them through the crack beneath the door. The perspective is warped. Their feet are grossly oversized, their heads are tiny. Their bed is an altar, built of stone.
The television provides the light in the room, beside their bed. The light blankets their bodies. It’s my face in the television. My mouth is opening and closing, slowly shaping words I can’t hear. I don’t remember what I’m thinking. When they grope each other, I feel their hands on me. I’m writhing inanely. My body’s activated with hatred and lust. I can’t tolerate it. I stand up and pound on the door.
(1985)
A MAN
I’ve structured my time. There’s no room to move. I know everything. An unexpected experience is an intrusion on my autonomy. My body’s an intrusion on my mind. I don’t remember standing where I am. My body’s dragging me down with it. My body’s impenetrable, filled with lead, pushing me down. The window’s closed. The air’s pressing against the pane. The window’s part of my body, part of my skin. My body’s filling up the room. I’m trying to turn my neck. Her breath is slowly moving along the skin on my back, warming an area slightly larger than her mouth as she moves up, then down. The sensation of the skin coming alive with her breath is sickening: my skin’s out of my control. As she moves, the areas on my back that have been warmed, then passed over, return to normal: they don’t exist. Instead of going over me area by area, she should consume me. She should take my body into her mouth and bring my body temperature to the teperature of the inside of her mouth, ruining my awareness of myself. I’m incapable of avoiding her. I can’t make the decision to move: that would draw my attention to my body. I’ll forget where I am now. I’ll be forced to recognize my body as an object I can’t control. I won’t be solid. She’s talking to me: the words hit my body, then fall off onto the floor. They’re physical, hard chunks of phlegm and blood. The impressions they make on my flesh when they hit stays for a few seconds, then gradually evens out and blends in with the surrounding flesh. As the words pass out of her mouth, I equate them with the blood being pumped through my veins. She’s on her knees in front of me. I want to open her up, disassemble her like a curious piece of furniture or a mechanical device, not worrying about how to put it back in its original configuration as I place each piece to the side. I have to make a decision: I have to either get rid of myself through her as she fucks my body, or I have to eliminate myself or her, before she fucks me. I don’t want anything to happen. I’ve ordered my time so I won’t notice it. I want to dissolve. Her hand’s on the inside of my thigh, her mouth suffocating my groin. She’s drawing me out into the room, away from myself, into her. I have to negate myself before I become aware of myself through her. I’m on my back on the floor. Her body’s a mouth around my body. Her face is indistinguishable from the ceiling. I don’t know if I’m part of the room, part of her body, or if I’ve taken her into myself and ceased to exist as I knew myself before she fucked me. I’m submerged, inhaling water. I’m saturated. I’m being compressed. My body’s filling up the room. I’m pressing the life out of myself as I press her into me. I’m wrapped in her tongue. I’m using her body to kill my body.
(1984)
RAPING A SLAVE
I’m being followed. I’m being dissected. I get raped constantly. I’m trying t
o build up my strength. I have to fight you off. You’re stupid and slow, but I have to be careful. As you look at me now, I can feel you trying to rip my body apart. You’re going to eat it bit by bit. Once you’ve trapped me, I’ll be all yours. You want to cut me up and devour me. I’m stronger than you are, but I need time to plot out my actions. Every cell in my body’s ready for murder. You’re not going to hurt me. I’m going to take what you give, chew it, then drown you in your own violence. I’ll suck your cock, gently licking your asshole, and you’ll think, “This bitch is an animal. I control her. She’s made to suck my cock. She’s completely mine.” I wrap my lips around your hard prick (I made it hard, so it’s mine), then I bite into it, slowly at first so you don’t think I’m teasing you, then I rip it apart. You faint like a woman. I suck your gristle and sinews roughly down my throat into my stomach. There’s a hose of blood shooting out from your crotch into my face. I stick my mouth to the hole where your cock was and drink the blood until it stops. You enjoy it. I’m made to eat your cock, not suck it.
I can’t count the ways in which I want to mutilate you. My hatred and my desire have always been inseparable. Your hairy arms could crush me or I could hack them off with a machete. You think you can manipulate me. “Intelligence” in this case isn’t a virtue. You don’t know the power of your own brute strength. You’re scared of it. You have to figure out ways to justify it. You suffer from guilt, proving your weakness. You should be proud of your ability to dominate physically, but instead you cower from it. You’re frightened of your tight muscles when you inspect yourself in the mirror. I can use this to my advantage, teasing you, ridiculing you to the point of murder, then satisfying you slightly (so you deflate) in order to put you back beneath my foot. You actually enjoy licking the soiled undersides of my feet. What a weakling! It doesn’t even excite me to have you do it. It’s the natural order of things, to have you down there. I’d like to stroll through a room full of half-conscious naked male bodies, poking and slicing with my machete until I’m up to my knees in a sea of blood and male flesh, occasionally stopping to decapitate some guy, picking up his severed head and french kissing it until I fall down among the carnage, mixing my come and bliss with the blood. That’s the unspoken truth. It’s what you attempt to push to the back of your mind each time you try to seduce me. You are a joke, you are a clown, you are a eunuch.