it was a Wednesday, like any other,
and bored of school i decided to
cut class.
i walked around Oakland for a while,
debating on getting my tongue pierced.
i’d heard the horror stories of
pus-ridden
infections and uncontrollable drooling.
as i walked into the piercing and
tattoo shop
i took
a long
slow
swallow
forcing the taste of bile out of
my mouth
i hope i don’t have bad breath…
and half paid attention as the man
with the metal face ran through a long
slow list of the things i should
and shouldn’t do for the next few weeks.
as i looked at him i began to see
not the jewelry poking out of his face
in odd places, but the holes going
through his skin, the two in his lower lip,
stretched beyond what’s normal for
a piercing.
will i end up like this?
two steel rings
with wires thick as pencils
protruding from my
lower lip? will i ever
be able to set off airport metal detectors?
the rest of it passed in a blur,
the piercing itself took
only a minute or two. some
Listerine, not nearly
numbing enough, and then cold metal.
a clamp
to hold my tongue in place. i could
hear the buzz
of someone getting a tattoo in the
next room,
wondered if they could hear my heart
pounding.
the needle, three inches of hypodermic
steel,
slid hotly through my tongue and
then nothing.
total numbness set in as the balls
were twisted on
and i rinsed one last time with
Listerine.
i don’t even know the name of the
man who put
a hole in me.
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