Hair extension on subway track
stand-‐in for a soul conjoined with you,
dead
nevertheless
formerly of Mumbai or Goa
or Cortelyou Road
the texture change made you explode
they blended, seamless, carefully rowed
Not a memento mori
of someone from Astoria
or a Church Ave. relic
from a delicatessen
Strands with unknown epigenetics -‐
did ancestors witness Jefferson’s prophetics?
spark slave rebellion in Barbados
or farm tomatoes?
Shackled on Thisslewood’s Jamaica plantation?
Collapse on Salt March fight for nation?
shamed by Clarence Thomas cola hair
(he said it wasn’t there).
Outline of a hypocrite
genes of European
or rickshaw caste
braids of now and distant past
narratives that do not last. Hair does
leaving hints of was