Lol poetry

I dwell in the esoteric.

They'll never find me here.

Three weeks ago

I held up my hands to my reflection

Showed it that

my knuckles were raw and cracked

"How can that be?" I asked it.

"I use lotion."

This morning,

my reflection shouted back:

IT'S BECAUSE YOU CHEW THEM.

And I could not tell if it was I

Or some character in a story

Who was relieved by this revelation

of oral fixation

and is it self-recognition

Or divine inspiration?

This compulsion to chew:

When people borrow my pens

I pre-empt their disgust

"I'm sorry, I chew,"

and I feel disgusted for them

Even as they take my ruined implements

and say "thank you"

and

"It's okay"

and

take notes on

the late cretaceous.

I feel connected to Paranthropus

That ancient relative

whose skull looks more

gorilla

than human

Thet call him

"hyper-robust"

and I memorize teeth sizes

jaw widths

sagittal crests

And I feel connected

because he got that way

through thousands of years

of being compelled

to chew.