My Affair with Pain

Just a little silly to help get me back in the flow :)

I sought him out
never knowing who he was
or letting him know me
we met at night,
when the shop was empty
only the dedicated would
cross the threshold
or other little girls like me
I needed him -
needed what he could give...

only when I lay back
against that vinyl chair
and heard the tap tap tap
and the whir and vibration
could I really start to relax
the first needle touch to my skin
and the little pain it gives
makes everything else so...
inconsequential
for an hour, or six
I'm transcended
I'm free
the worries that drove me there
evaporate with every swipe
I'm bleeding out my cares
letting pain wipe away my stress.
He won't ask questions,
he just keeps going
buzz, whir, buzz whir
and by the end
I am new - transformed.
Pain.  Art.  The best affair.

Reviews

[Zoe Jay]

Ha, I am tattooed myself, and this is awesome. I hate the pain, but it is also a sort of catharsis. It is very significant how and why and when we choose to mark our skin. We have done it since time immemorial. The markings we put on ourselves may reflect our lives, but also, we sometimes do not realize, that marking our skin my also profoundly change our energy. It is something that we instinctively know to be significant in the flow of energy, and that is why we feel compelled to do it, for all sorts of reasons, sometimes on impulse, sometimes after long planning, sometimes of necessity. A person's tattoo marks both reveal their soul, and change it. This poem is a great little rumination on how outward change and inward change are mutually interlinked and affect each other, as well as how physical pain may both counterbalance, and flow from, emotional or spiritual pain. I like the symmetry and sentiments of this poem :-)