Home > Poetry > 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.
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Published: Wed Jul 1 2015
Salman Toor, Fag Puddle with Candle, Shoe, and Flag (detail), 2022. Courtesy of the artist and Luhring Augustine, N.Y. Photo: Farzad Owrang.
Online 2015 Aging War
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.

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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)

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