Free Verse, Prose Poetry

Good Hands

 

 

I saw a sign today that said: “LOOKING FOR GOOD HANDS.”

And I thought, what does that even mean? “Good hands?” Do they mean, like,
baby hands…? Because I would think, by default, they have the best hands, you know?

Fresh, unlabored, unspotted, tight.

I’ve never thought so much before about what it means to have “Good hands”…

Is it like having good boobs because I feel like that’s a thing. I don’t think I have good boobs. They’re too small and a little uneven I think; but that could just be the tilt of my head when I look at them.

Anyway, maybe they meant to write “God hands”…But that would make even less sense because does God even have hands? Would He need them? Well, I guess He would because people use the word “touched by God” and it would kind of be weird if He didn’t have hands…I mean, what would He touch people with then, his nose? But I digress.

I’ve always thought I had “Good hands”. They’re petite. Not too many noticeable scars. Just a small one at the hinge of my thumb where my dad accidentally scratched me one time when I was young in the middle of a wrestle war, and I cried and he cried, so I won. And my nail bed isn’t too bad either. It’s clean. Maybe in need of a trim, but definitely perky. Can nails be described as perky? Oh well. And I haven’t got too many wrinkles yet; I mean, I’m only in my twenties. But now that I’m looking I can see these lines, almost like an etching, that no matter how hard I rub, don’t go away…

At one time I thought I could be a hand model. I guess everybody thinks that at some point. And now, I’m starting to think my hands aren’t good enough to be models, just like the rest of me isn’t fit enough to be a model.

But they’re hands! How can one not have “Good hands”! (Unless they have none, then I’m sure they have some other rockstar limbs!)

But even my aunt, who suffers from rheumatoid arthritis and winces at the pain of bruised and swollen knuckles, has the sweetest hands that daily aid and comfort the elderly in a nursing home. And my dad, whose calloused, irrevocably dirtied hands have built the very desk my hands now rest on. And of course my mom, who flashes the most vibrant nail polish, applies hand cream ritually, wears gloves to fight the cold, and also played with my toes as a baby, undoubtedly has the best hands.

Now that I think about it, it’s actually really hard to discriminate against hands. I don’t think anyone’s hands aren’t “Good hands”…

Well, except maybe Lady Macbeth. Her hands were pretty bloody.

 

Screen Shot 2017-11-28 at 8.01.26 PM
A casting notice that inspired this poem. 

 

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

© Catherine Luciani and “I Am Not A Poet”, 2017. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Catherine Luciani and “I Am Not A Poet” with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Free Verse

The Guard

He paced back and forth like clockwork.

Like a synchronized pendulum
he traced lines on the floor,
etching his history from
Point A to Point B
and in between
he flattened out mechanically,
compounded with
heel toe
heel toe
ordering chaos,
stomping out flaws

Like a cartographer
the soles of his feet
sketched the landscape
molded from his footprints,
leaving sunken dents
of rolling hills
and majestic valleys,
swelling waves
and rocky mountains

But as the years
blew past
his pounding march
stilled
and the phantom
thump thumping
died away soon after
his universe corroded
and now all that remains
are miniature toe craters.

 

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

© Catherine Luciani and “I Am Not A Poet”, 2017. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Catherine Luciani and “I Am Not A Poet” with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Free Verse, Love Poems, Narrative Poetry

This is not a love poem

I am thinking of You on a day like today.

And I don’t even know who You is. All I know is I wish You were here with me, sitting beside me on this two-person bench currently occupied by me and my stuffed-up pocketbook. I wish You were here to watch me scribble                sporadically           my thoughts of You

thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You thoughts of You

and add in some much needed details.

I imagine You’d have better, more legible handwriting and a keener, more critical sense of language. Our collaboration would be magnificently spectacular—other-worldly—unimaginable to a wandering brain easily distracted by the perpetually nagging question of who You

                  You                                          You                                         You                              

You                              You                  You                              You                              You are.

Whose creation are You, really? Are You my own, here, conjured up by my vague words and lonely heart palpitations?

Do You even exist? Or are You already dead and gone? Have I met You once before or simply dreamed You up in countless variations; never knowing Your name or face or gender. What if You are actually me, vague and indeterminate, separated by mirrors and camera lenses, glossed over by passing headlights and questionable 20/20 vision.

But that cannot be because I have put You on a pedestal, unlike myself who I have constantly torn down.

You are someone that I cannot see yet, high above me in an airplane in the clouds that I see now floating above this lonely park bench casting shadows along the water’s edge. If I look up will I see You smiling down at me? Would You even recognize or pick me out from the millions of dots You see crawling wandering pondering searching fighting breaking crying writing down below?

Perhaps I’ve missed You completely in these past few pages with my head tilted down or perhaps I was blinded in the brief moment I looked up for air, the words of who You might be caught in my throat.

Who knows if I will ever know You. Or if You will even know Yourself…

Besides, how could You have known that all this time I’ve been waiting for You to appear. You might look different than what I imagined and, in the end, have worse handwriting than me. But I can only hope beyond all this that if/when we find each other whether it is five minutes or years or miles or centuries from now that I was the You You’d been looking for also.

 

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

© Catherine Luciani and “I Am Not A Poet”, 2017. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Catherine Luciani and “I Am Not A Poet” with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.