Extraction

That now familiar aroma of dental paste
tugs me from a deep, medicated sleep.
I curse the dental assistant for waking me:
I was dreaming a wonderful dream
of a monkey playing the piano.
He was a spitting image
of Mozart. Only with more hair.

I am whisked away to another room,
and this one has darkened lights.
I silently thank whomever it was
that invented them.

Once I see my new-found friend,
Mr. Oral Surgeon, I smile at him.
He smiles back at me, with broken teeth
of his own:
shards, shattered, reminded me of a windshield
that has been busted, repeatedly,
by flying baseballs.
With a deep, burly voice
that hints of too many Winston-Salems,
he whispers I am better now;
the cavity that has been bugging me
is now being shipped, Fed-Ex style,
to the golden-haired tooth fairy.

I grin back at him, although it deeply hurts
for me to do so, and I feel a question
rising up from deep inside my chest.
I almost ache from it.

Yet still, I ask: "What about the other
black hole in my life? Can you not
extract that so easily
as you can a tooth?
My good friend, I will pay you
triple the amount of any operation
you have ever performed before."

A puzzle expression
belonging to one genius of a man
follows me out the door.
Yet as for me - I am smiling:
gap-toothed, yes, but still a smile.

I traverse back to my apartment
and eat rough, three-dollar steak.
For the first time in my life,
I feel not one once of pain.
What a wonderful feeling!

And it only increases
as I take four, or five
(who really counts, anyways?)
white, oval Vicodin tablets.
They were prescribed to me
for "any pain, or discomfort."
Perhaps Mr. Oral Surgeon,
the king of the Metal Pliers.
really was a stupid bastard
after all;

because now
I am cruising down I-95 North,
avoiding honking cars and middle fingers
like they are the swine flu.
My "lover," if you will,
is tied up in the backseat:
screaming, through a mouthful
of white masking tape.
And I am laughing:
laughing, laughing like a sick person
with a once-aching tooth,
who can not break out
of a drug-induced haze.

"Just go to sleep,
and when you open your eyes
that little nuisance will be gone."
I whisper this out loud,
watching, from my rear view mirror,
as my lover's eyes grow bigger.

And then, metal hits metal.
Engines are pulled from their sockets:
crunching, twisting, popping -
almost like teeth.
Tires are squealing.
People are screaming.
And I feel a bone
ripping from its socket.
"Shit, not two in one day!"
I think in my head.
Dimly, I become aware
that I have no Novocain
for this certain procedure.

And as I pass out,
I dream again.
This time, the monkey
is playing a clarinet.

And oh, the irony!
After the flames
extinguish the flesh
of myself, and my lover,
all that remains of her
is a
shiny
white
tooth
lying on the concrete.


~J.V.Harker~
~Thursday 30 July 2009~