High tide becomes slack
As the moon retreats
And the ocean welcomes
Gravities hostages
The twice daily battle
For position
Is inevitable and endless
High tide, low tide
Summer, winter
Day and night
Sun and cloud
Life and death
It all cycles
But the full circle
Will not be finished
For a long time yet
And when I think of the bad times
I take comfort in knowing that they will end
And with the knowledge that they will be back
I make the most of when times are good
Because that's the way it is
And the way it must be
Thursday, February 20, 2014
The Storytellers
My hands lie still
And yet they still tell stories
Episodes of a live lived
Neither poorly nor with constant excellence
But a life lived none the less
They tell stories of good deeds and stupidity
Mistakes made
And debts paid
I regret none of it
Both are freckled from the ferocious sun
I am wary of the harsh rays
That pull melanin from my cells
And tattoo my body
No doubt some grizzled medical professional
Will some day gouge
A cancerous mutation from one of my hands
I will try to avoid that
If I can
While freckles denote too much sun
The white freckles under my nails
Denote a lack of something else
Zinc, apparently
All kinds of snakes
Have tried to sell me a cure
And I bought none of them
They tell stories these hands
The scar on my right thumb
From leap frogging a concrete pylon in Dunedin
Drunk of course
The thumb nail is slightly retracted
From when keratin met the meat slicer
While I was teaching the new guy
How to safely slice reconstituted turkey
My thumb still peels
From the dishwasher chemicals
Chemical dermatitis
Three years on
The myth still owns me
My index and middle
Bare the almost invisible scars
Of an aluminium door closing on them
When I was nine years old
I sometime wonder
What would have happened
If I had lost those fingers
My fourth finger and pinky?
Boring
But they played a part
In making sure I forget
The back of my hand
A constellation of freckles
On a new skin canvas
Bombing a small hill on four small wheels
And eating shit on stones
But the main thing is
I saved all the beers
My left hand
The gimp
Don't throw too good
And plays lousy guitar
It's quite good at clapping I guess
Or maybe it's all the right
No
It's a good hand
It holds the page as I now write
It holds the fish as I sever flesh from bone
It holds my second beer
Because sometimes one is not enough
It holds the branch as I saw wood
To keep my friends warm
The one scar my left hand holds
Gifted by a barbed wire fence
And I ran through the forest
And shared my blood with the earth
It's the hand that touched my grandfather
As he lay in state
And I knew he was gone
For he was wax
It's the hand that touched her last
As she walked through the gates
And I miss her
But it can never be undone
It's the hand that cradles
My unborn child's head
As I hold and are held
By love
My left hand holds
My grandfathers signet ring
Manu Forte
The Strong Hand
Almost seventy years old
It is worn because it has lived life
And that's all I can ask for
At the end when I am wax
That I am worn
Because that will mean
That I have lived
And yet they still tell stories
Episodes of a live lived
Neither poorly nor with constant excellence
But a life lived none the less
They tell stories of good deeds and stupidity
Mistakes made
And debts paid
I regret none of it
Both are freckled from the ferocious sun
I am wary of the harsh rays
That pull melanin from my cells
And tattoo my body
No doubt some grizzled medical professional
Will some day gouge
A cancerous mutation from one of my hands
I will try to avoid that
If I can
While freckles denote too much sun
The white freckles under my nails
Denote a lack of something else
Zinc, apparently
All kinds of snakes
Have tried to sell me a cure
And I bought none of them
They tell stories these hands
The scar on my right thumb
From leap frogging a concrete pylon in Dunedin
Drunk of course
The thumb nail is slightly retracted
From when keratin met the meat slicer
While I was teaching the new guy
How to safely slice reconstituted turkey
My thumb still peels
From the dishwasher chemicals
Chemical dermatitis
Three years on
The myth still owns me
My index and middle
Bare the almost invisible scars
Of an aluminium door closing on them
When I was nine years old
I sometime wonder
What would have happened
If I had lost those fingers
My fourth finger and pinky?
Boring
But they played a part
In making sure I forget
The back of my hand
A constellation of freckles
On a new skin canvas
Bombing a small hill on four small wheels
And eating shit on stones
But the main thing is
I saved all the beers
My left hand
The gimp
Don't throw too good
And plays lousy guitar
It's quite good at clapping I guess
Or maybe it's all the right
No
It's a good hand
It holds the page as I now write
It holds the fish as I sever flesh from bone
It holds my second beer
Because sometimes one is not enough
It holds the branch as I saw wood
To keep my friends warm
The one scar my left hand holds
Gifted by a barbed wire fence
And I ran through the forest
And shared my blood with the earth
It's the hand that touched my grandfather
As he lay in state
And I knew he was gone
For he was wax
It's the hand that touched her last
As she walked through the gates
And I miss her
But it can never be undone
It's the hand that cradles
My unborn child's head
As I hold and are held
By love
My left hand holds
My grandfathers signet ring
Manu Forte
The Strong Hand
Almost seventy years old
It is worn because it has lived life
And that's all I can ask for
At the end when I am wax
That I am worn
Because that will mean
That I have lived
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