I kneel, prostrated
Between your lower limbs
Forehead to the back
Of your hands
Reveling
In the Quiet Gift
Of being with you.
One day this skin
Will be like paper.
This skin
Your hands—
Parchment,
Upon which
You've written your life.
Like paper.
Life paper.
Dorsum
Scars and burns—
Administered by the weather
Of your life.
Scoring one side,
Each a story
Of change.
Other marks
Palmar,
Cultivated with intention.
Knicks
From the building,
The building
Of your life.
You have held
Both life
And death
In these hands.
Who, who
Will have the honor
Of holding them
At your death?
At that moment
Of you exhaling the
Final whisper of divinity
That you have to offer,
May the felt sense be the same
As the day
I prostrated before you—
A contentment,
Pregnant and ordinary.
