What Are You

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.

Yet now 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.