Once even I couldn’t tell
my left arm from my right.
Time confused everyone
before I bit the fingernails
of one hand down to the wrist.

Now, afraid of my hunger,
it wants to bend at the elbow
and hide behind my back.
It moves slowly. It’s all I can do
to keep it straight.

 

Published in the February 22, 2019 issue: View Contents
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Bill Ayres is working in his seventh bookstore. His poems have appeared recently in Plainsongs, The Windhover, Bird’s Thumb, and the Anglican Theological Review.

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