Things We Do with Our Hands

We touch, and thus by assumption we feel

We mold things to life, we fix or we heal

Broken homes or broken bones; wounded hearts or scattered shards

Of glass, like glass houses or fragile minds

We use them to be cruel or capriciously kind

We cover our eyes, we lead the blind

Or we feel our way around with fingertips for eyes

We touch, and thus by assumption we feel pleasure

Or pain, or both in a masochistic way

Skin on skin, fingers over lips or over whips

We hope that in the end we’re satisfied at least a bit

We break things, like paper wings on folded paper planes

That we fold the way we fold our tales, our sheets at night, our wishful mail

Written with careful fingers under candlelight as nocturnal birds take flight

We write ‘I miss you so…’ then fold the plane and let it go

We lie, by proxy I suppose when we write falsities or sins

We apologize with the things we buy, most commonly being roses

We hurt each other, for pleasure perhaps in a sadistic way

But the worst we do is say good-bye

With something as callous as a quick and airy wave.