John the Barber

by RD McManes

John the Barber starts waving a comb,
"Next time I remove hair follicles
it’s with wax strips!". Forget using tweezers.
Bald is the wave, and pain is the ocean.
(He had been down on Main Street looking
for some shaved head, which is unusual
for a barber.) The stranger mumbles
through somebody’s semi-sown lips about
the telling attributes of hair plugs,
causes of male pattern baldness, and
economic repercussions of synthetic hair
on a democratic and mostly free society.
John was concerned about this stranger and
the latest fashion statement so I told him;
”Never take more than you leave
or lend more than you have and never
take an empty box home.”  His eyes
light up.  He packs an electric shaver,
a used hair vacuum cleaner,  two pounds
of deer jerky, a fistful of rubber combs
and five pounds of salted peanuts, still in
the shell.  (You wouldn’t believe
what a barber keeps.)  John walked to
the door with a single lock of the stranger’s
long brown-gray hair,  a memento from
the last floor sweeping.  “Something to ward
off the baldness out in the wilderness.“
he mutters.  The screen-door slams
as he flips his sign “ Sorry we are closed.”