Alligator Teeth    Al Simmons    

A month after Hurricane Katrina I was touring some of the hardest hit areas in Louisiana.  The destruction was incredible, but the resilience of the residents was even more remarkable. I saw a house smashed up against a bridge I was driving over, so I wasn’t surprised to see a 7 foot long log lying across the middle of the road.  I pulled over and was about to get out of the car and move the log out of the way, when the log lifted its head and walked away.  It was an alligator.  The night before I received a message from my son, telling me that my granddaughter was reluctant to brush her teeth.  With both of those thoughts in my head I wrote this poem on a postcard and sent it to Ashley.

An alligator from the swamps in the south

Was celebrated for the size of his mouth.

His gigantic smile was so wide and so clean,

He clearly believed in good dental hygiene.

[CHORUS]

The alligator brushed and he flossed and he polished.

Every hint of decay was abolished.

Every stain was erased

With crates of toothpaste,

Till every piece of plaque was demolished.

His hide was green but his teeth were clean. 

His teeth reptilian were one in a million.

 

He brushed on the top and he brushed underneath.

It took him twelve hours to floss all his teeth.

He loved brushing teeth but what he loved dearer

Was seeing his own smiling face in a mirror.

[CHORUS]

He was winning many accolades grinning in the everglades.

Such a big smile but why the long face?

These habits, I’m sure you would never surmise,

Would lead to the alligator’s early demise.

His dental duties took so long to complete

He never found time to find something to eat.

[CHORUS]

His teeth were white but he had nothing to bite.

A gigantic lizard with an empty gizzard.

You know, I’ve loved reptiles from the gecko. 

He won an award for the cleanest teeth, and what did he get? Very little plaque.

The little tooth fairy was suitably wary.

BUT… dental contemplation led to his starvation.

He was napping when he should have been snapping.

The thing he was eschewing was the act of chewing.

The molar of the story is jaws be careful and do not cater toothy alligator.

My friend told me that he saw an alligator in Africa. 

That was a crock!

And that's the tooth, the whole tooth, 

and nothing but the tooth.