Skin Series 4: Skinned Alive and out the Window

Skinned Alive and out the Window

Here I am in you.
Ready to finally see you.


I took my sweet time:
concealing
manipulating
and recoiling you.
But perhaps I'm ready or not-

here I come.

Touch and scratch
and mark and taste
and squeezed
too pressed
and bit with ease.

Oh, I'm aiming too hard again
and missing some point or target
on the horizon-

line to be checked and crossed.

Here is where it happened.
.I am not my cells.

Evaporating slowly
I am dissolving
in air solution
and in CO2 problems.

I am not with you anymore-
happy because I never was
or will.

Holding me down,
I leap outside
baring all while wearing none.
I'll leave the skin behind.

-Matthew Koutzun

Skin Series 3: The Sin has Come and Gone

The Sin has Come and Gone

Darling,
all the vanity has left me.
Promise.
I'm not the man in the images I've made;
just shape
pretending form.

Pride the manifestation of dignity
and vanity all the appearance of it,
or so my better half Mr.Darcy was complimented.

Please forgive me.
I call to you,
on edge of frame.
Please forgive me.

I took them off
and went too far
I'm trying to give you everything
without exposing it all.
Can't you see?
I'm altering image and shape
to try and show you truth.

Darling,
one more try
these flaws are mine.

-Matthew Koutzun

Skin Series 2: Sloth and another Sin

Sloth and another Sin

Look-it darling
I did it
done it
was it
for me.

Slow majestic
touching wasted
and I slid them off
to see it all.

What beauty I am.
Look,
don't blush-
look at me.


Free and exposed in the darkroom.
Red light on; to warn and call you in.


Darling look-it
what I've stretched.
And what's carved of me
I give to you.
Bask in it:
glory,
can you feel it?

It comes through pore
and image.

-Matthew Koutzun

Skin Series 1: Skin

Skin

Pliable
stretched taut
and smooth demanding.
Firm
tight bonded
and calm commanding.

Can I sit in you comfortably
to see without wanting to change
accept and know you can mold.
I'm learning you take attention
how a simple shift can take all eyes upon you
and a look can invite or dispel.


I'll open soon to you baby.
Once I find the strength to shed these clothes around you.
It's a task to just be alone here.


You're on me-
yet not.
I can't find you with me.

-Matthew Koutzun

We've Lost What Meaning Your Thorns Had

We've Lost What Meaning Your Thorns Had

Kateri Tekawitha,
they've lost what it means.
They take cuts for pleasure
and use crucifix dildos in vain.

They laugh as they defile
the things you knew could save us.
Insert without meaning
and penetrate without thought
they claw for answers
but still don't understand your thorn cocoon.

Kateri,
I prayed in the bathroom stalls
as I read the writing on the walls
and hoped that God could- would change me.
I didn't want to be me
and I jerked myself so I could be closer to him
so my words could be heard clearer.
I rubbed myself raw
and began to cry in the shower
as the soap used for lubrication
and to cleanse
burned as I came on the floor.

One time it was the elixir of life
and I cupped it in my hands and almost drank of it-
licked it, to see if I could become immortal.
But I stopped, not because it was my own,
not because it would be wrong,
but mostly because I feared of living forever,
and perhaps that you had heard
and that maybe afterward I would be someone else-
maybe I'd be gone forever.

"Catherine",
how did you do it?
How did your skin go pale as snow?
Did the blood leak from you?
You did sew so many thorns in your blanket.
Or did he hear you?
Did he hear you?
I want to say he heard you-
want to say you were brave
and confronted your prayers.
But now I don't know,
the water burns my back,
as I try to clean what mess I've made on the shower floor;
oh, how you changed me.

-Matthew Koutzun