We arrive empty handed, and leave empty handed. So then, how do we want to spend the time in between?
—Nimo, Empty Hands Music
For a time, I held
him. Before he
could walk, before
he could stand,
before he could
speak, I held
his full weight
in my hands.
Day became night
became day became
night became day
and I held him
and rocked him
and soothed him
and bathed him
and cradled
his beautiful face.
It didn’t last.
It never lasts.
But before he could run,
before he could
fall, before
he could choose
what I never
would have chosen for him,
I held him.
Oh, this gift,
to know the heft
of his life, to have been
the one—though
never again—
to have been the one
for a time, sweet time,
to hold him.
Posts Tagged ‘hands’
While I Could
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hands, holding, transience on November 5, 2021| 8 Comments »
Drinking Assam Tea
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hands, labor, poem, poetry, tea on November 20, 2019| Leave a Comment »
Malty, bright and voluptuous,
the tea meets me this morning,
and though I’m alone, the kitchen
is filled with other hands—the
potter’s, for instance, that threw
and trimmed and pulled and glazed
this favorite mug into mugness.
And the hands of the harvesters
in India who gathered the fresh green leaves
of the second flush, then
spread them on a tray and left them
to dry in the sun. And who rolled the leaves?
And who gathered them after they aged?
I wrap both hands around the mug
and inhale the musky scent of tea
and marvel at how much humanity
went into this simple cup. I stare
at my knuckles, my fingers, my palms.
It’s your turn, I tell them.
Serve the world well. Can you make something
so bold, so strong?
While Drying Apples for Hours, I Consider
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged apple, hands, love, poem, poetry, touch on October 15, 2019| 4 Comments »
It’s something the hands learn
with practice—how thin to slice
the apples for drying, how close
to cut to the core. In the same way
the hands learn to touch a lover,
how gently, how firmly, just where.
Oh the apple. What it knows
of desire. What it knows
of bruising, of bite. Oh the hands,
what they know of precision.
Of the pleasure of practice.
Of the joy in getting it right.
What Hands Can Do
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Bosnia, greeting, hands, poem, poetry, strangers, taxi on November 20, 2018| 2 Comments »
In my country, he said, we take strangers
by the hand when we greet them.
His taxi wove through the northbound cars
on Lakeshore Drive, and I watched his eyes
in the rearview mirror as they searched
the lanes for where to go. It’s strange,
perhaps, he said, to offer someone
your bare hand, but it’s a nice gesture,
I think. In the world beyond the car,
how many strangers did we pass
in one minute? How many chances
to reach toward another and say
Hello, or as they say in Bosnia,
Zdravo? How many chances
to open some small part of ourselves
and trust the other to do the same?
I wanted to disagree with the man.
I wanted to tell him, that’s what
we do in this country, too. But
clearly his experience told him otherwise.
Here, he said, people shake at the end
of a conversation to make a deal.
But not at the beginning. At least
not with strangers.
I want to start a revolution. I want
our country shake hands more.
I want us to extend ourselves
toward those we don’t know,
to offer them something of ourselves,
to be vulnerable, welcoming, kind.
When I got out of the car, I thanked the man
in his tongue, as he’d taught me, Hvala.
I paid with the credit card in the back.
I didn’t reach forward to seal the deal.
I stepped out grateful for what he gave me—
one more way to revere creation,
one more way to honor what hands can do.
Right There on Main Street
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged Clea Willow, hands, heart, love, parking meter, poem, poetry on March 28, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Imagine that your hands are an extension of your heart. Because they are.
—Clea Willow, yoga instructor
While slipping coins into the meter
I remind my hands they are doing
the work of the heart. They fumble
to find another quarter in my coin purse,
then drop it on the sidewalk
where it shines against the gray.
Isn’t that just like the heart, I think,
to bumble even the simplest of routines.
It could be so easy to search for, hold closely,
and let go at just the right time.
Come on hands, I tell them, do what
what the heart must do. Reach.
Recover. Try again.
Sole
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hands, letting go, love, poem, poetry on February 26, 2017| 1 Comment »
Like a boot takes the shape
of the foot that wears it, I imagine
my hand might come to take the shape
of yours, your hand—something
I was made to hold, made to move with,
made to let go.
Aspiring
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged hands, love, mother, poem, poetry on May 10, 2015| 3 Comments »
My mother’s hands are now
my hands—blue cords
of veins, brown thinning skin,
the fingerpads rough from gardening,
and dirt in the fingernails.
My hands, like hers, raise on their own
to gently touch a loved one’s cheek,
to pull the hair away from their eyes,
and to pull the loved one close.
These hands love to make pie
and do puzzles and pinch back dead flowers.
These hands are seldom still.
I do not know how to read a palm,
but I can read her story here
in these hands that were taught
to love the world, to stay open,
to find bells that long to be rung
and to ring them, these hands,
they are her hands, what a gift
to confuse them, to use them
as if they were hers.
Down by the Riverside Haiku
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cold, haiku, hands, love, poem on December 22, 2012| 3 Comments »
so cold I could al-
most forget about your hands—
not quite.