Little Things, Maybe

Something my dad said a long time ago.

Little Things, Maybe



Gnarled, arthritic hands, callused,
and yet invincibly strong. Short,
stubby with burled knuckles.
fingers embedded with years of steel:
blackened fingerprints. Yet
they still wield drumsticks
from Wipeout to the Battle Hymn,
still caress with gentleness.

Silver-blue larkspur eyes
surrounded by laugh lines
that fan widely. He can see
beyond, beneath, through:
a deer in autumn woods
at a hundred yards or a tear fall
from a turned head. Eyes of steel
that can soften to liquid silk.

My dad always said you
could tell a lot about a man
by looking at his hands, in his eyes.