avant garde / while i wash hair dye under running water -- poetry by Rhea Brennan

bleach on my scalp 

section hair by clips / plastic bowl / the spine of a brush / a plastic glove hugged tight against skin / my mother rested along the doorframe / she insists on her hand against mine, painting the roots / i remember finding her high school portrait in a plastic box in our attic / blonde & thin / i let her take the brush from my hands / i’ve always been bad about my shaky palms / she leaves and i am sat on the bathroom tiles with headphones coiled around my index / i pull tighter / i believe music is a form of worship / & i desire because i am human and there is too much in this world for me / i believe music is a form of worship / i want the rhythm of a dead man’s kick drum in my aorta / beat me until i breathe a little quicker / i want my ribbones to sing me to sleep / i want everyone to hear my song & why isn’t this bleach developing fast enough / mother, come back & tell me about your stereo / the one in your 98’ saab / i can tell you see yourself in me when i play thom yorke & pink floyd / is that why you hover by the doorframe? / i wash my hair under the neck of a faucet / i heard water holds memories / i’m asking for it if it does / stay stuck on my bare shoulder / but maybe memory isn’t as strong as the highest setting on my hair dryer

bleach / i wonder what it is like to be scalped 

i part my hair with the dull end of a butter knife / and trim the dead ends / my hair grows slow & i blame it on my mother / & how she said heat protectant is a scam / & she is gentler than i am when she helps me dye my hair / lines the nose of the paintbrush with exposed skin and dots the color on / i remember finding her high school portrait in a plastic box in our attic / blonde & starving / i wrote in a journal that night that starving must be a recessive gene / that i must be the product of some miracle / that i could receive it / she leaves and i am sat on the bathroom tiles with headphones coiled around my index / i pull tighter / maybe my fingers are sewn from the skin of a gecko's tail / i remember (accidentally) pulling a tail off and trying to put it back on / but body does not forget & the gecko slid between the floorboards of my porch / i love music where the singer sounds whiny & their voice has raw edges / that sound like boney edges of glasswork / i want to hear every song / & then listen to them all again / shove a speaker down my throat / and press your ear against my stomach until it creates a tattoo as deep as a bitmark, i will play for you like a songbird / why isn’t this bleach developing fast enough / mother, come back & tell me about your stereo over a kettle of chamomile / i hear the steam boiling at the pre-chorus / and you call me to the table when my hair is under the neck of the faucet / i heard water holds memories / i’m asking for it if it does / stay clung to the bottom of my teacup / & i will swallow you by the outro

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Rhea Brennan is a seventeen year old poet based out of Houston who attends Kinder HSPVA’s creative writing program. She loves second hand stores, analyzing anything from movies to prose, and finding new coffee shops to camp out at. She has been previously published at The Weight Journal, Octopus Ink, and Catharsis Literary Magazine.