My Mother's Hands

Photo: (c) Jamie K. Reaser

Today, I was looking down at my mother’s hands,

dry, crinkled, mapped out in wrinkles, veins as

meandering blood lines, literal and metaphoric.

I hadn’t before valued them. What they had touched

and held, what they had pulled toward, what they

had pushed away.

I remember, when a young woman, gently lifting

and guiding the gold ring from her index finger mere

moments after she took her last breath. I thought

about putting it on today, but I know that it won’t fit.

But, here are her hands.

© 2019/Jamie K. Reaser

From "Truth and Beauty" (a work in progress)

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