Gagging the English Teacher

When I fantasize about gagging the English teacher
I do not imagine coiled rope filling her familiar mouth,
how plush lips leave their bright marks on my body. 

To be released from the peculiar bondage of one
who knows too well the pleasures of the tongue,
how each symbol spoken knots with its shadow— 

is to be released from the heart’s pornography,
its failure to make love from our graceless funk.
The knotted rope does not mute but permits 

a muffled language—an animal muse confounded
by grammar, by the soft palate’s sudden distance, by
the prospect of speech as anything except obscene.


by David Winter

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David Winter wrote the poetry chapbook Safe House (Thrush Press, 2013). His poems have recently appeared or are forthcoming in Four Way Review, Forklift, Ohio, Harpur Palate, Meridian, Ninth Letter, The Offing, and Winter Tangerine Review. He is currently a Senior Lecturer in the Ohio State University Department of English, where he recently earned his MFA.