Thirty-three of Fifty

The gentle hand allows all things to speak in their native tongues,
but I wander restless, practicing and bruising. I love my handprints
too much; I grimace erasing them.

The voice is trained by singing; the brain, by memory and puzzling—
the heart is trained toward peace immersed in slights and strains.
The heart is taught to mend by breaking.

I am not gentle; if I knew how to make you laugh I'd keep doing it
until you were choking. If I knew how to heal you I'd burn away
on your skin like peroxide. I hold back.

Yet urges burn, as the urge to scream: Once I knew, once I heard every
tongue of every thing, I couldn't stop them—night and day they sang at me, and
clogged my eyes and throat and chest

so that I could not smell my own human desires.
Don't think life would be automatically wonderful if you chipped past the shell
into magic. Don't think your imagination won't snap your wrists
to keep you from leaving.


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