Plaits

As I bend the corner, she comes into view.

She’s well fed, serene, standing on her verandah with a neutral expression on her face.

Her fingers are busy but her mind is not, as she plaits her mother’s greying hair,

Carefully pulling kinky length this way and that.

Meanwhile, a symphony of car horns, reggae music, and bird calls drown out what her mother is saying to her.

An elder, submits joyfully to the care and attention of her child,

As a bustling Saturday unfolds around them both.

Generations of discipline, tradition, and love curl around every cornrow,

Weaving her lengths of hair into unbreakable ropes.