Nail Salon Poem Series, Maybe
Yesterday at the Modern Spa Nail Parlor on 72nd Street
new nail parlor I like to try them all some people go to the same one for years
yesterday at the New Modern Spa Nail Parlor run by Bonnie who ran
another place and called TEN NAILS I suggested to Bonnie once she try
calling it NINE NAILS for novelty's sake she didn't laugh she's not one for names though
she picked Bonnie when she came from China wouldn't tell me why .
Nail parlors are like the hairdressers of my mother's era. She went every single Friday
for her black lacquered synagogue helmet. Claudine would spray and spray my mother's
hair so that it wouldn't move under any possible circumstances maybe even a tornado.
At night she fastened it down with hair clips.
Yesterday I sat next to a woman who said that the man she met in college who sang next to
her in a chorus she married him and went to Juilliard to sing.
Thirty years ago, she said. Do you want to hear what happened she asked and there I was,
happy the stranger next to me was willing to tell me what happened, happy with my new
nail color Don't Call This Red said my nail aficionado Sally didn't offer any suggestions,
such as Poppy happy thinking about my mother's Sabbath hair ceremony, every single
Friday,and my nails