21 years of tugging and pulling

The smell of burning, frustration

My coils. A pile of disorganization

Tamed and captured by heat

The way you hold it is gentle

Your hands meet each lock’s path

Water undertaking what heat once captured

Restoring the language

Rooted in the matching bend of our curls

Your strands answer mine

Two dialects of the same land

Conversation with no sound

I am known

Self-incineration

submits

to the

trust

of another