#477 - I love the things that hands have touched

20.iv.21

477

2.80

I love the things that hands have touched

 

the knob, the brush,

banister, coolamon

 

bones fashioned into ornament

the bottle filled again

 

coin that once was bread

the come-in-spinner call it

 

the rod, bakelite the twiddle dial

I love the world light touches

 

and these are pleasure to the eye

book of a far century

 

leaf through and I pass on

path of hind paws

 

step is touch, map too

I love the frets, the stops

 

to catch and to despatch

these beads weren’t always smooth

 

a creek’s held pebbles

speak of the former flood

 

the keys, the strings

pages where a pen has been

 

paint and the ink are under, gone

lip first to breast, the cradled head

 

a tree rubbed cattle smooth

fingers tell stitches and the thread

 

fate in the hands of a jury

one digit up to breath of belonging

 

orchard to purpose come ripe

pick or wait for windfall

 

softly and softly come to catch

delight the randomness of time

 

not all things touch me but a few

I love the luck of where I am

 

and mean to make the most

as other hands and other times

 

pilgrim palms, fate’s lines

your ghost has none of this

 

goes through

an effigy worn off

 

paws’ touch the burrow’s sculpted sides

all this much creature too