By: Zachery Noah Rahn
My teeth are holy:
they have cavities
slit tongue and make
a stutter me sing out
groans my dentist asks
if I still candy binge
it’s bad for my health
I won’t give it up I know
the holes they’ll get worse
maybe I’ll conjure oral
surgery
if I die tomorrow
then would I care
I chew me up
my boy left me
candy from Jalisco
when he gone cold
that summer his body
his body his body croaked
my tongue can’t speak
my head can’t brain
when I sleep at night
I crave chocolate
bees count my teeth
I swear I hear them
grinding caverns of grit
and grainy minerals
zizzing tunnels in my mouth
boy’s dead now his neck
his neck his neck his neck
swallowed his jaw bone
one sting was all it took
for him to be pulp
stolen from my gums
a root canal of human life
Zachery Noah Rahn (he/him) is a queer poet and essayist with a bachelor's in Writing & Linguistics from Georgia Southern University. He enjoys watching horror movies, rollerblading, and spending time with his cat. You can find his work in Alien Literary Magazine, Stone of Madness Press, mutiny! Magazine, and select other journals. Follow him on Twitter @zacheryrahn
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