The Scar We Give Ourselves

I bit it in the meeting without thinking.

Didn't feel the wound until my tongue

found it. Metal taste. Sting.

All afternoon I pressed and pressed,

checking if it was still there,

the hurt I'd made. I couldn't spare

myself from touching it, from the

proof that something in me could still break.

Every swallow brought it back.

My tongue found it a hundred times.

Found it still. The small design

of damage I'd made. Still mine.