diff --git a/racket/src/configure b/racket/src/configure
index 6e6360cb35..86e48fb970 100755
--- a/racket/src/configure
+++ b/racket/src/configure
@@ -4792,6 +4792,11 @@ fi
     PREFLAGS="$PREFLAGS -DOS_X -D_DARWIN_UNLIMITED_SELECT"
     try_kqueue_syscall=yes
 
+    # Although select() generally works as well as poll() on OS X,
+    # getdtablesize() appears not to be constant within a process,
+    # and that breaks static allocation of fd_sets
+    try_poll_syscall=yes
+
     # ".a" is typically not useful, since we always build a ".dylib":
     if test "${enable_libs}" == "" ; then
       INSTALL_LIBS_ENABLE=no-install
diff --git a/racket/src/racket/configure.ac b/racket/src/racket/configure.ac
index 579b400c39..e37b39ec5a 100644
--- a/racket/src/racket/configure.ac
+++ b/racket/src/racket/configure.ac
@@ -873,6 +873,11 @@ case "$host_os" in
     PREFLAGS="$PREFLAGS -DOS_X -D_DARWIN_UNLIMITED_SELECT"
     try_kqueue_syscall=yes
 
+    # Although select() generally works as well as poll() on OS X,
+    # getdtablesize() appears not to be constant within a process,
+    # and that breaks static allocation of fd_sets
+    try_poll_syscall=yes
+
     # ".a" is typically not useful, since we always build a ".dylib":
     if test "${enable_libs}" == "" ; then
       INSTALL_LIBS_ENABLE=no-install