8. Naola Beauty Academy, New Orleans, 1945
Made hair? The girls here
put a press on your head
last two weeks. No naps.
They learning. See the basins?
This where we wash. Yeah,
it’s hot. July jam.
Stove always on. Keep the combs
hot. Lee and Ida bumping hair
right now. Best two.
Ida got a natural touch.
Don’t burn nobody.
Her own’s a righteous mass.
Lee, now she used to sew.
Her fingers steady
from them tiny needles.
She can fix some bad hair.
Look how she lay them waves.
Light, slight, and polite.
Not a one out of place.