Muscles of facial expression let you show your mood,
While muscles of mastication help you grind your food,
Facial muscles come in groups, which we’ll cover in a sec,
Oral, orbital, nasal, auricular, forehead and neck.

The oral group, or mouth muscles, help you make expressions,
The orbicularis oris puckers for kissing sessions.
This muscle is a sphincter, a circle maintaining constriction,
One of two facial muscles, that have this distinction!

Other oral muscles divide, into the uppers and the lowers,
In general the upper group, are happy expression showers,
The lower group are more, useful for sadness expression,
Such as annoyance, anger, concern, and even depression.

The upper oral muscles, we will now discuss,
The upper lip is lifted by the levator labii superioris.

Zygomaticus major, minor, lift lip corners when you smile.
Orbicularis oculi give you crow’s feet all the while,
But when you fake a smile, eye muscles don’t get engaged,
Only the risorius does, making the smile look staged.

The levator anguli oris, it moves mouth corners up.
Levator labii superioris aleque nasi that’s pretty crazy, yep!
It elevates the upper lip, for example when you sneer.
Nicknamed the “Elvis Muscle”, it trademarked his career!

The lower oral muscles, there are three of these,
Mentalis, depressor labii inferioris, depressor anguli oris.
The mentalis is at the furrow, between your lip and chin,
Nicknamed the “pouting muscle” it shows displeasure within.

The depressor anguli oris make mouth corners descend,
When expressing displeasure, on these you do depend.
Depressor labii inferioris also help you frown,
For they help pull your lower lip sideways and down.

Now for the orbital group, first orbicularis oculi,
These sphincters circle eyelids, to help you close each eye,
The corrugator supercilia, pulls your eyebrows medially,
The depressor supercilia, moves your eyebrows downwardly.

On to the nasal group, the muscles around your nose,
This group has three muscles, the nasalis the largest of those,
Its made of the transverse nasalis, and of the dilator naris,
For squishing and flaring nostrils, also called your nares.

Within the nasal group, the procerus is next,
It causes the nose to wrinkle, when your eyebrows downward flex
Depressor septi nasi assists the alar part of the nasali
When you flare your nostrils wide, on these muscles you rely.

The auricular muscles – move the ear and number three!
They are the anterior, posterior, superior, see?

The forehead has the frontalis, which wrinkles the forehead,
It lets you raise your eyebrows, to show surprise or dread.
The platysma has mandibular, nodular and labial parts,
And when you tense your neck, big wrinkles it imparts!

The four muscles of mastication, for jaw motions are employed,
Temporalis, masseter, medial and lateral pterygoid.
The temporalis closes the mouth and retracts the mandible.
The masseter is the strongest, so bring it to the table.

The masseter has two parts, superficial and also deep,
Both help you lift the mandible, to make you a mass eater!
The medial pterygoid also helps you to lift your mandible.
With a deep and a superficial head, so your mouth is expandable.

The lateral pterygoid’s two heads take control.
Align the temporomandibular joint, and open your piehole.
Finally, the buccinator, accessory muscle of mastication,
Pulls the cheek toward the teeth, to push food from this location.

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