Thursday, February 01, 2007

New Poem on NYC subway's "Poetry in Motion" series


"A Little Tooth"

Your baby grows a tooth, then two,
and four, and five, then she wants some meat
directly off the bone. It's all


over: she'll learn some words, she'll fall
in love with cretins, dolts, a sweet
talker on his way to jail. And you,


your wife, get old, flyblown, and rue
nothing. You did, you loved, your feet
are sore. It's dusk. Your daughter's tall.


---Thomas Lux



A crisper version of the poster here.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

thanks for posting -- been trying to find it since I read it and it made my cry on the train (I just had a daughter a few months ago).

Anyway, thanks

Anonymous said...

Bless you. I have been searching everywhere for this poignant poem to read at a community poetry night and nothing...until you! Deanne

Anonymous said...

I could not agree more. I tried to scribble the poem into my notebook on the A train this AM because I wanted to point out to my students the cleverness of the rhymes. Thank you.

Anonymous said...

I commute daily on NYC subways and this is the most touching poem in motion I've read. I held my tears upon reading. I felt the train moving fast and life was moving ahead even faster. Before long my station would arrive and there I'm, it is dusk and my daughter is tall.