The Cut by Alexandra Ernst
I remember a time
when a braid
hung down your back
like an extra limb.
It was the soft brown
of the Battenkill
which ran east to west
outside our door.
I wound the strands
with my fingers
each morning.
Today,
you’ve cut them short,
dyed your scalp
the color of dandelions
gone to seed.
As you preen for our friends,
this well-clipped style
wins praise from most.
They do not remember you
at twenty
combing out the knots,
everything you touched
wild and overgrown.
Alexandra’s poetry has appeared in IO Magazine, The Minetta Review, and The Anthology of New England Writers. Though she has lived in Paris for the past fifteen years, she spends each summer hiking with her husband and two small children in the Adirondacks and in her former home state of Vermont.
