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The Bald Truth
by Bob Hicok

My hair went on a diet of its own accord.
Rogaine is the extent of my vanity.
It didn’t work but it was fun
treating my head with fertilizer
as if it were a phrenologist’s lawn.
They were on to something in believing
the skull you have is the soul you are,
that the brain is involved in the sport
of tectonics. My skull has a fault line
like California’s, which makes sense
given how the hemispheres of my brain
collide: the right side
wants to clean the house while the left
knows dancing is the best part
of who we are. Or vice versa,
I always have to look that up.
They say baldness means energetic things
about parts of me that aren’t
falling off. The real compensation’s
having no choice meeting the mirror
but to accept that tomorrow
will be different than today.
And greeting my wife,
not wondering, as pretty men must,
if I’m kissed for my soul or face,
to never doubt, as I become invisible,
that I’m seen by love.

"The Bald Truth," by Bob Hicok, from INSOMNIA DIARY by Bob Hicok, copyright © 2004 University of Pittsburgh Press. Used by permission of University of Pittsburgh Press.