Dentures

Grams always liked to scare me,

to see if she could get me to laugh.

She would bare her gummy cavity

that resembled a witch’s mouth.

Sometimes she’d pop her fake teeth out

into her hand and shove them in my face.

Even these fake teeth were yellowed

and chipped, plaque filling any gaps.

I’d shriek in disgust but then choke on

relentless laughter. Her lips always

seemed too big for her mouth when she’d

joke like this, and they would smack

between every lisping syllable.

Her passing has left me bereft, looking for

someone to take her place. I find solace

in the nursing home where there are an

endless number of people with false teeth

available to startle me.

But sometimes I wish that they would

put their teeth back in so I can stop making

paltry copies of my Grams among these toothless

people, with altered speech and shrunken faces.

The teeth at the nursing home are in all

shapes and sizes. They soak in Efferdent

after meals, with yesterday’s lunch floating

in the sudsy cleaning solution. Some teeth are

rotten, decaying, while others are all in a row, white.

I try to hold back a laugh when they don’t fit well—

they hop up and down in the mouth,

almost as if they cannot stand to stay.