My Mom said my hair wasn’t rightfor ponytails or pigtails. You’re not a normal girl.A barber’ll know what to do with this mop, she said. I believed thatmy mom could make me pretty. She could help me find a way to
look whiter with a barber’s help. I hated my hair and classmatescalled it an Afro. I’m her white mother. This damn girl can’ttake care of her hair. Barbers said she needed to,let me grow my hair out. She said no.Pinched her thumb tip with pointer fingertip
to show the barber how short. I want it taken downclose to this girl’s head. Clippers buzzed, sheared hair like wool.I closed my eyes so I couldn’t see all the curls falling.
Donna Weaver. Donna Weaver’s work has appeared in or is forthcoming from the American Journal of Poetry, Aji Magazine, Solstice Literary Magazine, Drunkenboat, Colere, Poetry Motel, Lit Noire Publishing, Pavement Saw, The Crucible, Kota Press, Loop Journal, Big Toe Review, Controlled Burn, Pebble Lake Review, Fringe Magazine, GhotiMag, Conte, Whimmperbang Journal and others. She was awarded the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg-Scott Turow Prize for fiction, and accepted to the Cave Canem African American Poet’s Summer Writing Retreat. Donna was nominated for “Best of the Net Poetry” from Sundress Press. She is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh where she received a Bachelor’s Degree in English Writing. She is the founding editor of Caketrain Press.
