Ponytail

 

button down collars

under three piece suits

and military hair

 

made deals big and small

all over the world

styled in boardroom attire

till I folded my desk

shredded airline club cards

and retired to sweet air

of flannel shirt country

 

haven’t been to a barber

since bagging my suits

over mothballs in cedar

 

despite the bald pate

what fringes my ears

and unshaven nape

now falls like a flag

fully twenty-eight inches

waving its gray

and matching my beard

 

I blend in just fine

here among unshorn aging

sturdy good mountainfolk

 

save for amusing

mistaken identity

that sometimes has

taken me for

some grizzly old liberal

lost-in-time hippie

if they only knew

 

but I just play along

all the better to spy

in the enemy camp