In Praise of This Fear

Before you say anything else, I’ve tried
it all—cardio and acupuncture, tryptophan 
and volunteering, smoothies, SSRIs, and living 
in the moment, or welcoming this fear
in place of the other, one palm rivers sweat 
into the other, as my dentist takes my jaw 
to shake novocaine into my roots
until it lulls my nerves, wild with panic, 
an orchestra of horror begins, suction tube 
hisses as it clings over my lip, the clink
of the round mirror scraping my crowns, 
the cutting whir of the pulsating drill, 
vicious like a meat slicer, digs in decay, 
she hums instructions between steps, 
while I pray the sudden plume
of reeking dust doesn’t clog my throat, 
nothing goes wrong when I can’t feel 
anything, not the tightening clamp
to isolate the operative site, not the fishhook 
probing calcium, no whetted instrument 
that moves so close to my flesh,
she glues bonding agent to composite, 
her voice sparkles like she’s narrating
a fairy tale, how misleading my stillness 
that reflects the curing light’s blue glow,
hardening resin to restoration, how petrifying 
to give my mouth to sharpness, so praise
this fear that distracts from the dread 
of what has hollowed my bones,
that waits for me not in the waiting room 
but at the moment of this relief, when this
appointment is over; earlier I had said
that I need to fix my teeth because if I smile,
I smile big—here at the end, I sit up
to spit blood—in response to my explanation, 
the dentist had chimed, As you should

Read more from Issue 19.1.