Torture Methods (prose poem)

[trigger warning: somewhat graphic descriptions of sexual abuse and torture. seriously, do not read if you are sensitive to these topics. poem is after the break; seriously, do not read on if you are easily triggered by such topics. hopefully this is one of the last things i will ever have to write about this; do not take it as anything other than a self-exorcism of sorts]

One lays it out flat on its stomach and kneels with knees bent in upon its back, to make breathing more difficult and to strain the muscles.
For efficacy unmatched, one places one's hands upon its mouth and cranes back its head, to stifle the screams and to approach asphyxiation.

One grabs its arms, one grabs its legs, one twists and presses these in order to make it wish to scream. Something is in its mouth—it can't.

One smacks it and grabs its muscles, to sting and to mash, but never to bruise. One deals with competing demands here—one and one's own wish to see it bruised and bloody, even cut. It and its own will become suspicious if blood and bruises can be seen.
A little blood, here and there, cannot hurt, though. It already injures itself on the playground plenty.
One jagged cut, more or less, cannot hurt.

One rips off its clothes, of course. This is a given.
One shits on its little body and rubs it in. This is its fault. It is its fault it is so dirty. Who else's could it be?
One makes it look into the lens, covered in shit, understanding what it is.

One leads it to a toilet, dirty and unwashed, and forces its face in. One yells at it while it can only half-hear.
It gasps for a split second whenever its head is pulled up, before going in again.
Breath is life and it has no life. What it is is in the toilet.

In between, one takes cold water and pours it all over it, in order to rinse off the shit.
One takes rubbing alcohol and rubs it all over it, especially in any scrapes or cuts, in order to wipe off the smell.
One does not use anything to scrub off the feeling. It will have to make do.

One stages the main event.
At one side, one nearly chokes it. It understands this as rotten cheese. It makes no noise; it has already learned that noise gets it nowhere.
At the other, one stabs its intestines with a blunt object, as a lady of this design must make oneself known. One massages its back as one does this, as if to assure it of something it cannot quite grasp.

One finishes this.

One presses stop here, and, as before, shows it its past performances. It is disappointed. As it has been learning for the past couple of weeks, it is a bad it. No matter what it does, it understands that it is a bad it.
Nothing can ever make it not a bad it. It brought this on itself. And it should appreciate this for that. For being the type of love appropriate to it, bad as it is.
It learns that many people with money and good names love watching it. Those people love it, and want to see more of it.
It learns that if it says anything about this, ever, it will die. Its parents will die. Its friends will cry.

One holds it and gives it a snack. One reminds it of its talents, both in this bathroom and outside of it. It knows that it has to develop into an intelligent adult with the gifts it has now. It knows that is why one is here. One is necessary to it.
One is necessary to them.

One brings them back to the main room, through a circuitous route. One lets them go. The past 12 minutes have been an hour.

One is necessary to them?

Now this is all on camera. Now it may spread as a fire in a dark dry catacomb, or as a flood drowning miles of damp sunless caverns.

Or perhaps the flame will burn down to lonely stray embers, and the water will be nary a drop.

They hope it is the latter.