My smile is my favourite thing to wear
(Ectodermal Dysplasia Awareness Month 2020 – Poem by Ami Hopkins)
My smile is my favourite thing to wear, How about you?
It goes with everything and absolutely nothing too!
You’ll feel better for smiling, the world will seem brighter
It’s not made up by some fictional writer!
Mine didn’t come easily, not like the rest
For mine was not gifted, nor was I blessed
I didn’t have that pearly white grin
All neat in a line, and full to the brim
I was born differently, some teeth never presented
Nor did I leave many out for the tooth fairy I resented
My friends trading teeth under pillows for money
While I waited for my teeth to grow, some thought it was funny
Years of questions and “your teeth aren’t the norm”
Makes you feel silly you start to withdraw
As you get older you embrace what you have
And realise there isn’t a norm so smile and laugh!
For everybody is different in their own special way
My smile is beautiful I don’t care what they say
The most beautiful smile is not about the aesthetics
But about the reason it appeared there in the first place
Smiling is an action and what you see represented in pictures
But more than that It’s a feeling, or several, a mixture
It bursts out of us all, in a big cheesy grin
Whatever your feeling, if your smiling it’s a win!
Next time you mock or think that’s not very pretty
Tut tut such a shame, for you I feel pity.
Smiling is catching, without it your sad
Turn that frown upside down and realise what your day lacks
Smile and the world smiles back it’s true
And what a better world it would be if you just smiled too.