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Holding the small, blue comb, I use it to style the few hairs hanging on my great-grandfather’s head. He takes away the comb.
Diego Isaias Hernández Méndez, Convertiendse en Characoteles / Sorcerers Changing into Their Animal Forms (detail), 2013, oil on canvas. Arte Maya Tz’utujil Collection.
Holding the small, blue comb, I use it to style the few hairs hanging on my great-grandfather’s head. He takes away the comb.
With my waist in one hand,
with the other, he points to the television.
Ships blast one another; in a grainy war
documentary, water sprays the camera:
“See that ship, right there? I was on it.”
I look at him, then back at the TV.
Guns sputter-like pots and pans
beaten together when baby Laurie
made music. Water churns.
I slip the comb out of his hands,
climb behind his head,
guide the teeth between his silvered
strands, letting fingers slip between their silk.
Chelsie Meredith is the author of the chapbook The Birth of Andromache (Finishing Line Press, 2014). Her poetry has appeared in Pleiades: A Journal of New Writing, The San Diego Poetry Annual, AGNI Online, and Mosaic. She teaches creative writing and literature in Houston. (updated 3/2015)