Again

 With blunt fingers nimble as anything

he builds and maintains and loves.

His hands are a tally of scars--

here he cut his palm and

there a nail tore the skin--

count them and tell the litany of his days.

What do they hold, these capable hands?

Babies and bibles and birdhouses and my hands 

when he makes me fly.

Again, Daddy!

A flat black pencil marks the cut on the board

he lets me hold with my little hands.

His fingers close over my little feet

and lift me up up up

Again, Daddy!

His hands are warm, callused, gentle, big.

Sometimes they give a shake--pay attention!

Or cage my head in rough affection to kiss my forehead.

Sometimes they are dirty and smell of crude

or sawdust or horses or all three and Lava soap, too.

He holds my hands around the stick

so I can burn the marshmallow without losing it in the fire.

When the days march on as days will do,

he opens his hands to let me fly free.

Leaves them open in case he needs to

catch me.

Now his hands are often idle

or clasped in prayer.

They tremble, fragile as onionskin,

the years in flesh so quick to bruise.

His hands hold the history of him,

of love and life and daughters,

of breaths taken and released

and counted down to the last.

They hold my heart and they alone

recall the shape of my baby skull

when it lay cupped in his hand.

Again, Daddy.