[Poem by Robin Wright]

After my fear of teeth being twisted,
cut, pulled like plugs for barbaric
bloodletting, after the mask covers
my nose and the nitrous has reduced
my hands and feet to far-off
sensations, thoughts fly from my body
and laugh from above.

But I endure, rise, retreat
from the chair, no longer still,
no longer the surgeon’s
mouthy masterpiece.

Robin Wright’s work has appeared in or is forthcoming in Indiana Voice Journal, Eunoia Review, Peacock Journal, Unbroken Journal, (b)OINK zine, Lost River Literary Magazine, Rat’s Ass Review, and others. Two of her poems were published in the University of Southern Indiana’s 50th anniversary anthology, Time Present, Time Past. She has also co-written two novels with Maryanne Burkhard under the name B. W. Wrighthard, Ghost Orchid and A Needle and a Haystack.