I bite my nails.

Past discomfort but
never to blood. Just
ragged fragments
of a supposed protection.
Just jagged shingles.

I bite my nails.
My dad used to tape
all my fingers or swab them
with who knows what.
I still didn't stop.

Even when I paint
each one to perfection,
hours later chips stick
to cuticles. Color flecks
on my tongue.

I bite my nails, but don't
think I don't want to stop,
be ladylike, prim, simply
trimmed. If only they weren't
so accessible to nerves.

All these nerves that make me
chew my lip, chew my inner cheeks,
chew on anything but especially
these nails. Biting down the layers
that could protect me.

--Kari Jackson, 2007