Détente

By Pamela K. Taylor

A slip of pink chiffon 

It might as well be concrete

A  Berlin wall of fabric

between you and me

Thank God

If we try to cross

This textile no man's land

No guns will fire

No dogs will leap

To tear out throats

No Fletchers here

We stand to lose

Only our own conceits

Come!

Let us be the Wetzels

The Strlzycks of hijab

Let us soar

On scraps of nylon

On discarded bits

Of misperception

Soar over the covered hairs

The covered minds

Into uncharted

lands of amity