Thin Hair

Each Botox doctor praises my thin hair.
At least seven times, during the migraine quelling
thirty shots to the skull and neck,
they comment encouragingly on
my “nice thin hair.”

How they “find the spots so easily”
with their impressive needles full of botulism.
“Oh, see how easy it is with your nice thin hair?”
they comment repeatedly, without a hint of irony.
My head blushes. My split ends preen.

I am used to needles loving my “big green veins.”
But my meager locks have never commanded such praise.
I imagine the doctors despairing over a thick mane,
tsking as they worry through the brush of a more populated head.
They say “thick hair” as if they might murmur “tough luck.”

The beauty standards have been reversed,
and I imagine now strip malls filled
with hair-thinning salons, sashed with huge banners declaring:
“Rid yourself of unwanted extra hairs on your head—half price—grand opening!”

Ads pop up on news feeds everywhere:
“Tired of looking like you are about to appear in shampoo commercials?
Banish unsightly fullness from your scalp: 30-day money-back guarantee!”
On my way out of the office, I note the young woman going in after me.
Her hair, a black lagoon at midnight, an ink well spilt over onyx.
A pang of pity stabs my temple.

I turn and whisper, “Don’t take it too hard.”

Self by Prescription 

O, the oblong, kidney-shaped,
apricot-serrated, pillow-round,
pale blue dream—

There is a science in balancing
the pills’ volatile contradictory calendars,
alkalizing conflicting agendas.

This one unearths
ice picks from ocular nerve,
ear drum, and dims thoughts’
evasive aura. My senses
pulsate into floor boards.

That one puppets
marionette limbs
to lift plate to sink.
Jell-O’d muscles give,
as water washes plate
straight through hands.
A porcelain symphony scrapes
across metal sink sides,
and shatters my skull.

And this one controls pain’s
acute expiration date;
forecloses the hollow
bone house left
when the nuclear glow gives way;
allows me to swallow the dull throb,
the nauseous air, the heady light.

The death knell for my
natural senses sounded
over two decades ago.

Unmedicated cells
that fluidly carried
the organs’ rhythms and
the flesh’s thesaurus
are a lost country.
Each line on that
globe leading back
has been undone by
chalky erasers.

My skin’s ship docked
far from any known
topography or ancient
map’s lost sea.

There is an art
to pouring yourself
out of so many bottles.

I am mixing up a new galaxy.
I am naming every star.

Jennifer Bradpiece was born and raised in the multifaceted muse, Los Angeles, where she still resides. She tries to remain active in the Los Angeles writing and art scene. Jennifer has interned at Beyond Baroque and often collaborates with multimedia artists on projects. Her poetry has been published in various anthologies, journals, and online zines, including Redactions, The Common Ground Review, and The Bacopa Literary Review. She has poetry forthcoming in Breath & Shadows among others. Jennifer’s manuscript, Lullabies for End Times, will be available in early 2020 from Moon Tide Press.