Writers’ Hands
By Niall Twohig
Looking deeply at these hands
I see flesh and blood that will dissolve.
But this hasn’t happened yet—
Don’t live life in the dissolution!
There’s enough time
for that
after life!
* * *
Looking deeply into my hands
I see all the writers’ hands that
shaped me into a writer.
I see those hands at work,
writing on trains and buses,
on sunny beaches and dim lit pubs,
in cold jails and warm studies.
Everything moves around
those hands at a pace, sometimes slower
often faster,
But those hands reserve
their rhythm, reserve
the right to
their own time,
their own beat.
I see those hands stalling,
thumbs twiddling,
pinching tobacco,
grasping a pint,
clenching a gun,
trimming a rosebush,
extending a prayer.
I see the revelatory moment:
those hands
finding sacred Words.
Words
that carry them to me,
Words
that close the gaps
then to now, writer to reader.
Words
that dissolve them, then me.
Words that recompose us both
in new flesh.
* * *
Looking deeply into these hands
I see your mama holding my hands
on the day I revealed my love for her.
Out of nerves, I drank too much before we met.
I couldn’t string together words I
already strung together in a letter.
But she didn’t care.
She had read me long ago
and she felt what I felt.
Sitting there,
in silence, she gave my hands a little squeeze,
a gesture that told me it’ll be okay.
It will be okay.
I can feel her squeezing them now,
as I write so full of a fear
I cannot name
It will be okay.