POETRY: The American Fairy Tale, They Fell For It

When your teeth fall out of your mouth 

That does not only signal your own physical growth

It is also your body warning you about your age, about time 

That nothing is as reliable as it once was

Believe whatever you want

But nothing is permanent 

Stick the teeth under your pillow

Santa will slide down your chimney 

The Easter bunny is coming

Follow the rainbow

The American Dream too

They fell for it the same

And when there is no dollar under their pillow

No gifts under their tree or eggs to hunt 

When there is no pot of gold at the end of it all

When the porridge, chair, and bed are never comfy

The lumberjack won't save you from the witch

Ark of the covenant?

The fountain of youth?

You journeyed all this way

And like the fairy tale has been sanitized 

So has the reality of an irrational pipe dream

They feel duped, lied to because they believed in the fairy tale

Because despite the gruesome gore attached to the fantastical American fable

Despite all the evidence, paradoxically they believe

They were sure that the dream, the lie, the tale was real it was true

Photo of my son's two baby molars taken by his mother Lizette Castellanos.