Burying Teeth

The cavities between my teeth
sting with the rush of ice water, a sharp-sitting
long-lasting dig into gums that did nothing wrong —
the sting in my mouth is a thing of regret and a thing of
pain well-earned from my
childhood sweet tooth

The sting is the thing in my chest as I drive home at night
while I hold my breath passing through the cemetery
cut in half by a road that is busy by day
and empty by midnight

As I’m holding my breath, the
windshield fogs funnily and
fingers of light and shadow are caught in periphery
and I don’t look off to the sides, just in case —

I cannot be caught catching sight of a Thing
that I know to be bad, or perhaps just not
in the right place at this hour
like a child caught in pjs, eyes wide
in the shine of the refrigerator light
unable to sleep in the thrall of the night
with their closet an eerie cavity of
open Unknowing where eerie Things hide

The heart that thumps thoroughly afraid in the
flesh-formed cavity of my chest
embraced by the ribs that protect it from
nosy soul-searching eyes and gaping phantom faces
as I pass through the places not meant to be thriving
with life at eleven at night

And the cavities in the bones of my mouth start to
ache as they grind from the feeling of strangeness
in the places where they make the strange phantom faces —
in the places where they make the soul-searching eyes —
in the places you ought to let sleeping souls lie —
in the cavities dug beneath grey mourning skies —

And come morning, the rain will bring with it dirt fillings
and grass crowns freshly springing
and soft sunshine flinging the living towards
something of meaning amidst a
clean-brushed, gold-filled beginning