Damp forest

our shoes sink with each step

my back strains 

my right hand dangles 

below my hip

the index finger moving toward

arthritic loneliness

in the cool air

 

Such poetry!

But I’m not writing this poem

from the forest or a 

muddy trail. I’m commanding

my swollen knuckle

to move along

with the rest of 

my four fingers

of the right hand

my five of the left hand

 

that tap and dunk dunk 

on my laptop

like underwater thrums

tendons and bones

relaxed even in pain

hang over the

keyboard

 

My high school voc teacher

told my parents on

parent-teacher night

how happy I was 

in her class

Sometimes I can hear her

humming as she types.

She was sure I would make

an excellent secretary

 

They couldn’t know

that each finger stroke saved me

from killing myself.

I was a happy depressive.

 

Four decades later

my fingertips still know

the keyboard in 

all its guises

Lucifer

Gabriel

Mary M or BVM

I can find the XY and Z like

nobody’s business. I can

( )   and I can  :   and   “   or   ‘

I mean even the weakest of these fingers

can find their way in the dark