Cover Image: Faith Nk
African hair, kinky hair, afro hair,
I love my afro puffs, round and curvy like the derriere of an Igbo woman,
Sprinkled with streaks of mahogany, coloured like honey,
The gods of nature were kind to my people,
My hair is my identity, the genes of my ancestors passed down to me,
A heritage intertwined like cornrows, held by strings of threads,
My mother’s DNA sprouting from within me,
Adorning my head like a crown, full as the Amazonian forests,
Growing thick and strong like the lion’s mane,
Gulping up oils while basking in the sun’s full glory,
Under running waters, it shrinks like a tortoise into its shell,
Only to bloom like morning glory when the sun comes up,
It curls on my fingers and I let it bounce back like a warrior,
Each strand a testament to my unwavering confidence to be proud of me,
They said afro puffs were not in vogue, cornrows have no place on the cover of Vogue,
I refuse to reject my traits because of twisted beauty perceptions,
My hair is locked down; I am not in dread of what people will say,
Fulani braids with the wooden beads, Bantu knots tied down to my roots,
Shuku, one million braids, just like me, my hair is versatile,
Rebel against the standard beauty culture, it flies high in the winds,
Unafraid, tough and healthy.
Chidera Udochukwu-Nduka is a Nigerian-Igbo writer, creative professional, and pharmacist. She has won several awards, including second prize in the 2024 Dissolution Climate Change Essay Contest (Litfest Bergen, Norway) and first prize in the Letters Category of LIGHT Magazine’s 2025 Trust Issue. Her work has also been recognized as a runner-up in the 2024 South African Bloody Parchment Horrorfest, shortlisted for the 2024 Akachi Chukwuemeka Prize for Literature, and awarded in the AS Abugi and Ikenga Prizes. A recipient of the Illino Media Writing Residency, her writing appears or is forthcoming in Midnight & Indigo, IHRAF Thorn, Aprilcentaur, Akpata, Valiant Scribe, Nonprofit Quarterly, Lagos Review, Carmakaly, Libre Lit, Inner Worlds Zine, PIN Best Poems of 2024 Anthology, and many more.
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