Vanishing Colors

By: Jasmine Barber

The blackness of my curls begins to plummet

from the root to the end.

Layers itself in texture and shape

like a game of tetris.

I am playing against time

twist and turn strands.

Into a new design

this is a level up move.

I only get

better in time.

As I steep into my years

the colors slowly seeped out.

Revealed the stress of

too many attempts.

To win in

a hostile environment.

I used to pull out the evidence

straight from the scalp.

But it returned like rain in the winter

I found silver linings.

In the sliver of silver clouds

that rest in the sky of my fro.

---

Jasmine Barber is a Portland based Writer, who is located in Portland, OR. Jasmine is a Black woman poet, print-maker, and multi-textural artist. She is also the co-owner of a Mushroom Farm, known as Pharm to Body. Her multi-discipline passions fuels her approach to her poetry, which is inspired by her past, current, and future life. Her poetry is themed in her experience as a Black woman, her work encompasses her identities and her experiences with family, grief, bad careers and anything that comes her way.