HANDS STUDY
[1] These
[2] we see daily.
[3] holding so little.
[4] Ringed
[5] Wrinkled
[6] Shaking
[7] filled with want.
[8] Scarred
[9] with broken blood vessels on knuckles, a long scar along the palm, brittle nails breaking.
[10] that need like lungs need air, need skin like flounder need sea.
[11] reaching out.
[12] sticky with blood, bleeding when the knife goes almost clear through.
[13] crumpling paper in fists.
[14] crushing too-rouge strawberries just to watch the juice pool between fingers.
[15] running through the creek.
[16] running through hair.
[17] holding so little.
[18] pressing against tense muscles.
[19] pressing into hands.
[20] with lunar dents as nails burrow into flesh.
[21] knowing where to touch. Intimately.
[22] holding so little.
[23] Holding
[24] Healing
[25] Let’s hold
[26] There’s something about this holding. This healing.
THE DAY YOU LEFT
I remembered
that wet Tuesday afternoon last winter
when the rain slapped the pavement
and the streets fullflooded
and we were the only ones brave enough
to leave our hearthside of shared bodyblaze
chamomile
clasped hands
and Henry Miller novels
and we ran outside
prancing like dancers with you first and me trailing
and followed the road lined with Georgia citrus
jumping into every grey streetpuddle
while the clouds poured rain into our worn boots
and then how
hands on knees
soaked from tress to toenail
I paused
trying to catch my breath
and you just kept running.
AUTOPSY OF A DEAD (EYED) WOMAN
Eyes: Rimmed red. Cerulean like the sea.
Flecked with orange, full of fire.
Nose: Freckled.
Hair: Heavy as the dawn. Curling
in the morning mist.
Lips: Small. Bitten. Uneven.
How the lower lip pouts out.
Mouth: Hungry.
Heart: Hungry. Full to the brim
with more than just blood.
Body Temp: Cold as winter.
Marks and Wounds: Scar tissue on knee.
Speckled skin—cheeks, shoulders,
thighs. A tiny tattoo. A jagged line
lining her triceps from that time
she fed a mare her finger.
Manner of Death: Accident.
Probable Cause of Death: A Monday.
Despy Boutris’s writing has been published or is forthcoming in Copper Nickel, American Poetry Review, The Gettysburg Review, Colorado Review, The Journal, Prairie Schooner, and elsewhere. Currently, she teaches at the University of Houston and serves as Poetry Editor for Gulf Coast, Guest Editor for Palette Poetry and Frontier, and Editor-in-Chief of The West Review.