In second grade, she cut her hair,
taking the blunt art class scissors
and squeezing off a thick lock
in the middle of her forehead.
a
Her mother grounded her,
saying, “We have to look at you,”
a statement her body
was not hers
to do with as she chose,
but a display for others.
a
In high school, she shaved her head
explaining that it cleared her vision.
We were impressed by her courage
and refusal to play the role,
but we also understood this too
was a performance and knew by then
how hair served as an advertisement,
conveying information about
danger
about wantonness
about madness
about who had begun
to become undone.
A faculty member at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Joseph Mills holds an endowed chair, the Susan Burress Wall Distinguished Professorship in the Humanities. He has published four collections of poetry with Press 53. His fifth collection, This Miraculous Turning, will be released in September 2014. More information is available at www.josephrobertmills.com and he blogs regularly at www.josephrobertmills.blogspot.com.
Christopher Wilson is an award winning Chicago based amateur photographer whose works have been published in books and magazines. To view more of his work, visit him on Flickr.