Gnashing teeth,
a grinding meet
of molars crashing
cuspid on cuspid
and the fracture of a piece,
of pressure not intense but awkward
in an anxious, unintended sense,
then giving way, the rapid play
of tongue immediate with censure
seeking each deformity,
the gross enormity a shard of tooth
hard and loose embedded with a chew
of food, the rude and vulgar realisation
that your perfect teeth are rendered
meek by random chance in thankless bite.
And the anguish is replayed,
the roughened edge is sought,
caressed obsessively, the ease with which
the tongue is grooved and scraped
and still returns though raw with pain
reminds you of the time again,
and time again and time again,
and nothing ever is the same.
© I.D. Carswell
