Page 139 of The Black Flamingo

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felt fantastic but now

I need to get it finished professionally.

My poster of Bob Marley

has come unstuck

at the top right corner

and droops down over itself.

I smooth it up and push

the Blu-Tacked corner back

onto the wall. “Nothing’s changed

between us,” I say to Mr. Marley.

In the morning,

I go to the one black barbershop

in Brighton; it’s like any black barbershop

you’d find in London. The barber by the door

has an empty chair, the others

are busy cutting hair. I ask him

if he can give me a trim and fade.

I think of Kieran from school and

how his fade always looked so fresh.

“No problem. Are you a student?” he asks.

“If so, you get a student discount.”

“Yeah.”

He asks what I’m studying as he gestures

toward his chair.

“English,” I tell him as I sit down.

He puts the cutting gown over me

and fastens it at my neck.

He asks, “What kind of job will you get?”

I tell him, “I want to be a writer.

I write poems and one day

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