How Many Years Does it Take to Accept It — Naturally? My Hair Journey

a poem by Kee

When I was young, hair was simple - mom took care of it all the time.
Absentmindedly, she’d work away,
hoping it would last the day,
creating those styles of thick braids or poofs, applying lotions for strength and shine.
Until one day at a friend’s birthday party - those braids entangled me.
I found myself stuck to mesh walls of Chucky Cheese.
Screaming to anyone, screaming to all, yanking my head around in pain,
an employer came running to my aid.
But he couldn’t free me, he left me alone,
returning with scissors to cut that hair I had grown.

Straight hair was what I noticed now, straight hair was pride.
It didn’t need daily tending, or so I saw through my eyes.
The first relaxer made me feel good, pretty and cool
but my grandma disliked it, had it cut off one day after school,
dreadfully short I grew frightened, and hidden from her view, cried.

When I moved somewhere new I cared little about appearance.
My hair grew wild but brittle and dry.
When people needed to ask me my gender, I would always sigh
Yet my friends loved me and filled me with their adherence,
so I pressed on in my feral hair years crusade,
paying no mind to my community’s focus on hair’s facades.

When I signed up for sports teams where all hair was long and straight,
I noticed my own hair was not up to par,
I became self conscious, mentally put en-garde.
On games days we dressed to match but my hair messed up their styles.
Couldn’t do those identical ponytails with ribbons because my hair was too short.
They all thought it, though no one spoke- no one was that curt.
I wanted to blend, to fit with the others with ease.
I relaxed once more,
entirely on my own accord,
knowing what was ahead,
and learned to religiously maintain it, day to night, from the moment I rose out of bed.
But that was the fall, and when summer came, and vibrant color hit the trees,
I grew lazy and just wanted to finally do as I pleased.
No influence could sway my mind.
I knew it was almost time.

My mind was my own, I knew what I wanted-
Unnaturally straight hair was not on my plate.
I would not be drawn by the same shallow bait.
I was beautiful naturally and using chemicals only haunted,
that conscience that cried out for me to be me.
And so I cut it off, the last day of school,
and a few months later, when more natural hair grew,
I chopped off the last bits of straight hair that I saw,
left behind the life of conformity and all.

When you see me now at 18, my hair is full of curls.
Though it grows slow and the length is hard to say,
I love it, and it fits me perfectly anyway.