What Am I
You touch.
No second guesses.
Pull.
Only common occurrences.
Pinch!
Not senseless.
Poke.
Nor offensive.
I guess I might ask questions too
if I were you.
And you were the one who walked about
With this fresh crop of
Unpredictability.
Fine.
I’ll admit.
It’s a creature attached to my scalp
Growing uncontrollably,
Ignoring headbands and flower clips,
Twisting itself in knots
And engulfing thin rubber bands.
You joke, you comment.
Fine.
I’ll admit.
It might as well be
alive.
Yet your whispers create my whimpers.
I scream and cry,
Yank and pull.
I hide away in lopsided buns and shriveled braids.
Oh, what I would give
to feel the heavenly glide of a direct flight comb
Swimming through my
Curly, enormous, thick, brown maze.
Pleading at my reflection:
Big bush— Go ahead!
Defy all laws of gravity.
Go ahead.
Stand alone.
To be or not to be flawed.
The hair on my scalp only itches with desire
To flaunt a multicultural identity.
Each curl sprouting a determined face,
But the ways of the bush
Simply will not accept detainment.
It yelps,
I cannot be boxed by a single race.
And now the whispers come from above.
Lively voices of each strand
Tirelessly combed away.
Patience.
Constantly hidden aside.
Patience.
Soon I will learn.
Patience.
To set this fresh crop of unpredictability
Free.