This is not therapy:
I already understand why I lose teeth in dreams.
I replace my real toothbrush every few months.
But, how often should I replace the cinnamon sticks my daughter and I hung over the doors? 
This could be a confessional:
my grandbabes are All.
They arrived after the cinnamon sticks we hung: 
my daughter’s abundance, both boys, my Joy.
They are why I brush, 
postponing my slow going
the way of sea turtles and elephants and gorillas and….
The oldest learned last week to say Turtle.
I hope he learns names of countless once and living things:
a name connotes Holy.
Every night, I hold my grandsons’ faces in my mind
and think their names,
willing their safety,
willing them whole.
I, as powerless as a toothless turtle flailing in an acid ocean,
wave a stale cinnamon stick at falling bombs.