Looking for grounding

Also, a bit of magic

It has been a strange week or two. I want to write about it, but it is so unwieldy a… a story? a filling-in? a meal? I am still chewing on it all, and in the mean time, numbing my brain with scrolling YouTube, brushing dogs, and reading poetry. I landed on “i know the grandmother one has hands” by Jaki Shelton Green, because the comforting truth of it made my mind sigh with the kind of relief you feel when stepping into a hot bath. I am happy to be a grandmother one, her hands always busy with trinkents [sic].

Photo by Philipp Torres on Unsplash

i know the grandmother one had hands

i know the grandmother one had hands

but they were always in bowls

folding, pinching, rolling the dough

making the bread

i know the grandmother one had hands

but they were always under water

sifting rice

bluing clothes

starching lives

i know the grandmother one had hands

but they were always in the earth

planting seeds

removing weeds

growing knives

burying sons

i know the grandmother one had hands

but they were always under

the cloth

pushing it along

helping it birth into

skirt

dress

curtains to lock out

night

i know the grandmother one had hands

but they were always inside

the hair

parting

plaiting

twisting it into rainbows

i know the grandmother one had hands

but they were always inside

pockets

holding the knots

counting the twisted veins

holding onto herself

let her hands disappear

into sky

i know the grandmother one had hands

but they were always inside the clouds

poking holes for

the rain to fall.

I found this poem on poets.org