Jen Gayda Gupta

Training

I was given an electric shock
collar for my dog. Before
the jolt of metallic fingers
ever prodded her neck,

I held the bolts between my thumb
and pointer and pressed
the lightning bolt button ‘til
my teeth turned to tin.

The shock rang from my jaw
into the follicles on my arms
dragging each hair awake.
My veins turned to ice. 

All the while, my dog chewed
a stuffed pig and listened
to its whine. After it ended,
there was firework in my blood. 

I pressed it again.
I pressed it again.
I pressed it until the lack of shock felt
like drowning in thin air. 

I grabbed the gutted pig
from my dog, replaced it with
the controller, and yawned
as she gnawed on the button. 

I became a subject of pain, disciple
to its knifed edge. I snapped
the collar around my neck,
a strand of fiery pearls. Now 

the jolts entered my brain, took
the wires inside and tangled them
into a muddled yarn.
My dog watched me squirm, 

bend to her jaw’s will,
become fleshy, carnal,
something without thought,
something well behaved.

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Jen Gayda Gupta is a teacher, an avid hiker and a horse lover. She is currently on the run from responsibility, living nowhere at all with her husband and their dog. Her work has been published in Anti-Heroin Chic, Bandit Fiction, Capsule Stories, Olney, Sledgehammer and others. You can find her on Instagram @jengaydagupta.