HANDS (AVALON PENINSULA)

There is something to know
about many hands
of wind slapping tamarack
and cuffing the dusty cotton fingers
of Indian Pipe beside the road - vigorous

hands shampooing unruly
heads of highbush berries crammed
in ranks between. We say
it is a giant coastal admonition, but
we do not know

how it is
with the hands of wind
and rooted living things, nor
how it is
with rooted things and rooted things, how
it is . with hands much less our hands.

Susan Downe