I took 3 mg of Ativan
and selected the orange scented nitrous.
I brought a support person.
I told the dentist I was scared.
I had an ice pack on my neck.
I’d applied the lavender essential oil.
I repeated my mantra.

                    –Pain is temporary.-

I’d done all the right goddamn things.
My palms still sweat.
Hair stands up on the back 
of my neck, my arms, my whole body.
My toes cling to the lining of my socks,
begging for leverage to the part of me  
desperate to avoid gnawing my way
to the nearest exit in search of a full moon. 

                  We review my chart.
                 “Does not respond
                  to local anesthetic.”

I unhinge my jaw before the drill.
I beg them to blast
every nerve root at once,
scrape the distal buccal
bullshit down to dust.
Extract every extractable thing.

I don’t even need a badge of honor 
or that porcelain crown. 

I need every human
on this side of the Mississippi
with a dontist in their title
to come together as one
Tie your most powerful strings
around my every last fang.

                                   QUICK

If you don’t expedite the heave-ho
of these skeletal growths from my mandible
you’ll learn that something terrible inside of me
is                         all canine teeth and crawling its way out.

The feral thing of me needs the pain to stop
or at least desperately muzzled for your sake.

It growls a slew of words in my ear.
“At least then they can’t touch our teeth.”