After mass when we had been extra good all week

and didn’t do nothing to warrant

an untold amount of time in the confessional

mama and daddy would take the seven of us

four girls and three boys down to the lake

we was all pasabonne white enough that we didn’t have to crowd all up on other folk

like down at the sambo watering hole their congregation was humongous

I mean lines and lines of ink spots desperate to dip their toes just once

like lake water would rid them of their soot

some didn’t make it at all cause they had to be home before darkness set

onetime granddaddy drove us past there just to mock them girls and boys

trying to be fashionable in their mammy made swim suits

coming out of the water looking like nappy headed runaways

my sister Lauren was more like my daddy side they was real light skinned peoples

french some canadian but german mostly

except their hair wasn’t as gorgeous as momma’s people

with all that Indian and spanish but mostly french from our maternal grandmama Lauren was the only one of us look like daddy had spit her out

her hair texture musta been wrought on her

cause of daddy sinning over dice

it was his refusal to atone against them snake eyed demons

left Lauren’s head looking like a crow’s nest

those were mama’s words not mine every time she took years off her life

trying to make Lauren’s head presentable to the world

she’d grace us with the same sermon ending with

Lord Jesus why have you forsaken this child’s head

Lauren chile you bet not roll around with no black ass man

cause I ain’t claiming no moss headed grandbabies

water was Lauren’s kryptonite so daddy would tell her

just sit on the blanket regal and sexy like you marlene dietrich

daddy had a peculiar love affair with marlene dietrich’s hair it followed him to his grave daddy would go on chiding Lauren and when they

(white boys) interrogate you as to why you ain’t going near the water

tell them it’s cause you never learned to swim and besides this swimsuit too expensive to get wet and then you go back to posing up a storm swinging that sandy hair

like you trying to shake free the frizzle

yep Lauren had the sandy hair like daddy’s people while Clarke had red hair and freckles

the rest of us had jet black hair with curls so tight mama kissed them bobbing ringlets

in the mornings long before she pinched our cheeks

her way of acknowledging the arrival of a new morning

and god’s good graces bestowed upon our crowns

 

as one would imagine with hair like ours we could balance life in and out of the lake

sunning kicking sand being chased and caught by white suitors

who thought highly of our seditty trot when vying for our affection the white boys

would rough house like gladiators but even with her kinky tresses

Lauren always managed the good prospects cause she was the blonde

one time this tall blonde haired blue eyed hercules looking boy squat down next to

miss marlene hollywood and she giggling like a starlet all seductive speaking in that

french accent till I think she began to believe she was foreign through and through

that white boy convince her to go for a dip and we start gasping

Clarke screams hey Marlene don’t soak your brain being overly stupid

but she had to show us she didn’t need our curls to get tagged

so Lauren go in and come out ragged headed like Annie (the doll)

when that white boy realize what he was holding at the hips

he almost jumped out his skin then came all the investigating

 

White boy-what’s wrong with your hair it looks like…

well it looks like…

you ain’t no nigger is ya I mean you can’t be but your hair it’s…

Lauren- It’s frizz my hair frizzes easy I know it looks like a bird’s nest

my mama says it gets like a bird’s nest once it smell water is that the words you were searching for bird’s nest

White boy- Look I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings or nothing

I just never seen nothing quite like that

and I’ve taken many girls into the water…

besides I hate them pasty niggers that’s how come I ask if you was one cause I know how they operate white niggers think cause they great great great great grandmammy give it up to their masters that make them white white as any real white person walking the streets

pasty niggers my papa warns the worse kind cause they quick to forget their place

quick to try and be something they can’t cause they blood still got a hint of nigger

and sure as the day is long they could drop a baby from their belly looking like it’s been dipped in tar with barbwire for hair that’s the word I was looking for barbwire

my pretty little barbwire barbie that’s your hair

 

but when I look at you I know you too sophisticated to pass besides with that accent you white

you looking at a boy who could spy a nigger perpetrating a mile away

couldn’t no blackymo be as white as you and steal my eye