My mother was always frustrated
by the long strands that tangled
around the base of the toilet,
on the edge of door and floor.
Sneaking onto the kitchen counter
wrapping around soup ladles
and frying pan handles.
Strangling the buttons
on her sweater.
I couldn’t help it.
When I combed it
--oh so gently and starting with just a short section from the bottom
and then a little higher and higher
until it was shiny smooth and tangle free--
the loosened strands would float
glinting and serene, only mildly affected by gravity
in their travels through our house.
They would mesh with the cat’s hair
the dog’s hair
until the hall was full of tumbleweedy bundles
that she had to shepherd out the door
with the wide brush of the push broom
we usually used for the garage.
‘It’s a wonder you’re not bald,’ she’d say
around her chewing gum,
and she’d hug the blue broom handle
before she put it away.
We watched as the finches came, two at a time,
to lift each tender, fluffy jumble-bramble
of canine-feline-girl hair
and flit away, like the birds in Disney’s Cinderella,
carrying their newest duvet to the nest.
070908, rev 072008, rev 072908, rev 090408
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ReplyDeleteoh, can i relate to this poem! it was like this all my life, but.... around five years ago, i lost about half of it, it came out in handfuls at the root. i was terrified and saw a specialist, and then it just stopped. i read somewhere on the web that women with tons of coarse dark hair often lose a lot of it in middle age. and i was relieved. no one believes me now, as i still have a shock of frizzy locks; but believe me, half of it is gone and i feel almost normal and it's a bummer. xoxoxooxox
ReplyDeletei love your detail so much, the many secret places the strands of hair find find their way to, "strangled around the buttons of her sweater", and then others like "she'd hug the blue broom handle/ before she put it away". this poem is so much about your love for your mother and that age-old desire for our mother's love and how we grow up together. you are a great poet. xooxoxx
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