Time will never Tell

With these hands
I have cradled the past.
With these hands
I have buried memories.
With these hands,
still-lined with life,
callused by death,
I grasp air in my palm
and feel it trapped there
squirming in a fist.

With these hands
I held my babies-once, long ago-
now forbidden to touch
With the same such tender care.

With these hands
I sealed my ancestors in dirt
now sealed away from all five senses.

With these hands,
I make words
that lose their matter while gaining typeface.
I multiply my meaning only to divide
by the given definition of what it is
To pen or poem.

With these hands,
I scratch the wet shoreline,
I was here
With these hands.
I open my palms
erasing my place

just in Time.


Image by By DashaVZ (Own work) [CC0], via Wikimedia Commons.