yaa gyanfuah of brown smokey eyes mascara
on a long wear easy foundation
and
a brown shadow pencil drew a thin line beneath her lower lip
if only yaa gyanfuah had applied intensive skin concealer, the ones called kings of the booth
she would have hidden yesterday on her face
and she would have looked much like angelina rose,
the american beauty idol whose life was
neither rosy nor angelic.
rose carried scars beneath heavy makeup to her long cold grave.
too often slander ladies
in petite blouses like yaa gyanfuah
summarize their stories in their ringtones
a boy calls them and the screen
becomes a blank page, they look but don’t see
they try to fix their faces in restaurants’ menus
pointing dishes like cursing the names of
all the boys who’ve stabbed them in the heart
when yaa gyanfuah threw her eyes on the mirror walls of the restaurant
she saw the debris of what was love on her face
she smiled and whispered to an innocent boy
who sipped a fruit juice at the far corner of the restaurant
love must hurt like a man screaming his mother’s name in a fire.
