Hands

Hands

Dusk is when I think of you

tying together the tag ends

of your day.

I sit, my body

a meditation on solitude,

contained, silent, still

waiting in the chill of a

fading afternoon, playing

with images:

Your hands

negotiating traffic madness

of highways stained in yellow

evening light;

Sea crossings that carry you

to your safe harbour, the place

to which I have no key.

Hands

command the steel edge

of a knife,

perform magic on the dailiness

of vegetables, conjure wizardry

from the mediocrity of

grocery shelves.

Pickup sticks of cucumber,

carrots, avocado,

the soft slide of

oil on Romaine, the dark blood

of beets:

This place where

you perfect your universe.

Hands

wander like nomads over

the keyboard, rebel fingers type

misspelled messages, create

an alphabet of thoughts across

the miles

to me.

My fingers fly through a sea

of words, diving

like thin, bleached bones of

sea birds

curved against the wind.

Words are my world, sometimes

a land mine between us, sometimes

a garden

where truth blooms, always

a pull toward some distant

golden past.

But I save the best image

for last, savour it

like clots of

pink cream on a birthday cake:

Your hands

dance across the shadow

of my heart, tender

as the wind

with harmonies that shimmer

like raindrops from

your fingertips.

Edythe Anstey Hanen

September 26, 2009