The surprise that his hands are those
of a blind man seeing from his fingertips.
No longer the child's hands whose palms I read,
map of the hand, his lines, mounds of Venus.
Now he needs no map at all
he's utterly found.
I've thought maybe he was a little lost elsewhere
pitching his voice a long way out of hearing
like some sigh of longing
a faint claw at the air wanting someone to answer
or perhaps no one
but these hands have no doubt
they need no instruction
in this task of stringing guitar.
His hands remind me of birds
his fingers their wings lightly flapping
on the fretboard
but really nothing like birds...
a decisive graceful fluttering
as the fingers tease at a knot, loosening
knowing tension is useless
and tension will yield.
His head is looking away
whilst the fingers titillate
and the strings trail and tangle
and somehow when the knot has yielded
the strings connect in the holes
there's a purposive tightening of screws
the guitar resumes its backbone
the fluid strings on the spine become taut
he grins that really it's nothing
this knowledge of his hands
his steady shoulders
the fingers knowing all that is to be known
that's when I saw he was flying.
Here a cool summer evening.
Our ancient 12 inch red-cased TV
is shamefully neat and cheerful
a tiny spyhole to a vast catastrophe.
In the still-burning south
a couple wander lost-souled
through the blackened dregs of their once-house.
The terrible silence of wreckage.
The girl reporter poised and glamorous
but today subdued in navy
dares to broach a question.
It is the man who speaks.
His wife merges into the backdrop of ash,
bends to retrieve a miraculous remnant.
He speaks like a boy who hardly has the words
to describe an adventure he was not party to
he wasn't holding the joystick for battles and smashes
this time as victim he pronounces his despair
without fanfare. Words come. Within the bubble of shock
he articulates his disbelief with surprising lucidity
humbled, generous
both levelled and expanded by suffering.
The wife continues to wander in the ash like a shade.
The reporter for all her youth is impressively respectful
knowing this is way beyond her
beyond all of them.