The Tooth Fairy Poem by Taylor Graham

The tooth fairy in her necklace
of teeth, and tooth earrings
and a gown as shimmery as spit,
takes them from underneath
your pillow, they say,
and gives them to newborns.
And only when the children shedding teeth
outnumber the infants needing
might she keep one for her own,
hung by a ribbon as pink as gums
at her breast, the so-called
milk-tooth. And when the toothless babes
outnumber children growing
to new teeth, then she
visits the pillows of dogs and cats,
hoofed creatures of all kinds.
And these are the infants whose smile
you cannot endure.