You come from Sri Lanka, Said the toy-shop keeper at Patti's Settlement, I know, your skin Tones are different from Indian, Not brown, a kind of slate, And you have that gentleman's gait -- When we lived in Virginia, My son's pediatrician Was Tamil from Sri Lanka And finely made, his face Has stayed imprinted On my brain for twenty years -- Here most toys come from China, American labor is too expensive, But the dolls in the back, Fashioned in Ohio, weigh as much As real babies . . . That seahorse Is not as heavy as the rest, If that's what you want, Two dollars ninety-nine Will be enough, and that Train for the tree, it's nothing At all, a dime . . . Twenty years Is a long time. Come back again. http://www.middlebury.edu/~nereview | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...CHAMBER MUSIC: 19 by JAMES JOYCE ONE OF THE LEAST OF THESE, MY LITTLE ONE' by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON PENDULUM by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON TO NANNETTE FALK-AUERBACH by SIDNEY LANIER |