Shear Serenades
you wanted to cut trans people's hair
so you became a barber we are crouched
on a decaying log at the waterfall's trail
stream's beginning forest mulch breathing
it's our first friend date i see a me in you
possibility i haven't yet known future from yesterday
you carry your clippers neck towel, now mine
a small barber bag pre- & one-day post-pandemic
do you know what you want?&
you talk about the lover you'd leave your lover for
it is late September i am beginning to love again
we are trying to catch the sun before it sets.
you tell me about the Russian mafia
you suspected ran the barber school
in Brooklyn the clients faded aggression
shut doors where were you supposed to go?
my eyes widen at the selfie cam mirror
all the queers in Bushwick want a bowl cut!
i don't live there the bowl is the childhood
i've outgrown
so we swerve we angle
we rectangle we shape-up
who do you become?
you wanted to cut trans people's hair
so you became a barber we speak of surgeries
& testosterone, the usual i don't want it
polyamory sounds difficult monogamy is too&
the beech trees believe us
circled stones listen who we are
who we are mistaken for
who we came here to be.
my vocabulary no matter how many barbers
i've seen we don't speak the same tongue
my mother still disapproves my brain refuses
to conform, still & lightbulb moment
River 瑩瑩 Dandelion is a poet, educator, and healing arts practitioner. He writes to connect with the unseen and unspoken so we can feel and heal. River is the author of remembering (y)our light, which was a finalist for the North Street Book Prize. He won the Lambda Literary Award for Exceptional New LGBTQ Writers. River holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Rutgers University—Newark, where he taught undergraduate creative writing. He has received fellowships from Baldwin for the Arts, Kundiman, Lambda Literary, Saltonstall, Ucross, Vermont Studio Center, and elsewhere. He is working on his debut full-length poetry manuscript. riverdandelion.com.