After I had cut off my hands
and grown new ones
something my former hands had longed for
came and asked to be rocked.
After my plucked out eyes
had withered, and new ones grown
something my former eyes had wept for
came asking to be pitied.
–Denise Levertov
* * *
I drove up to the seminary today. The campus smelled of the pine trees baking in the heat, of dry grass and, subtly, of Troublesome Brook. I know the smell of that place. I know the smell of the building where I worked for ten years, its damp basement, the smell of the cracked linoleum stairs in summer and of the sheepishly bearded students lingering in the entryway in winter. I know the smell of the copper beech tree under which the chapel bells are rung, and the smell of the concrete step behind the classroom where I used to attempt private phone conversations. The tired appearance of each as familiar as my childhood bedroom, their smells nearly as intimate.
Sometimes you cut off your hands because you need new ones for new tasks. Sometimes old hands just fall off over time, so slowly you barely notice new hands have grown. If anyone asked my preference, I'd go with the latter. But when I became a mother my hands were cut off rather quickly and new hands had to sprout. Well, they are still sprouting; I'm not entirely comfortable with them yet. They seem so awkward, scrubbed-red and impatient, these hands.
At the seminary today I remembered my old hands. I missed them. They had such a quiet, bookish life. Lots of time to think, those hands--and those eyes. The places those eyes had the leisure to linger! Too often I mistook that leisure for boredom. I remember this: I would be at Starbucks in Tuckahoe by myself, lonely, taking photos of whatever caught my fancy, and Jenny would call. She: "You're at Starbucks! By yourself! You're so lucky!" And I would smile.
I also think of this: whenever a new set of hands grew to feel entirely comfortable on me, they began to change. The confidence of being an old hand inevitably bringing about its own demise. A crude example of this is high school and college--by year four you've got your game going on just when it is all about to end.
Another baby is on his or her way, and I fear I need not new hands but a second set. But these are my only hands. And they may need another three years before they look as though they are at home on me. Let them remember other more bookish, carefree tasks; someday I will remember what they rocked today and smile.
{ p o e t r y w e d n e s d a y }
