Sent to serve as anvils against which craftsmen shape their ware <br />Chipped and scored and hacked and sawed, no heed paid to their care <br />Molten wax dipped, metal-wire clipped hooks from which are hung <br />Boiled sweet acrylic drapes fine polished, smooth to tongue. <br /> <br />Bearing coronets they wait, mute servants against the wall <br />Nurses take their hard-won crowns to patients to install <br />Duty done, at last returned to place where they were born <br />Woman eyes them ruefully, they look a touch forlorn. <br /> <br />Buries them without a word in refuse of like kind <br />Empathy is not required for things which have no mind <br />Words will not be needed when the woman's passed away <br />She and plaster teeth are equal universal clay.<br /><br />Diane Hine<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/no-elegy-for-plaster-teeth-part-2/
