a brief story about hands


I woke to find
my hands
humming in the dark

hands I said
what have you done?
where did you creep?
what did you plunder?

my hands did not answer
simply lay
upon the sheets still
humming
dreaming perhaps

of a great hand-shaped cloud
travelling steadily
onwards deep into the night

hands I cried
what terrible thing have you
what forbidden
and was afraid to switch
on the light

not knowing if I would
find my hands
blackened with bees
or breathing some cold song
or worse
no longer even
mine

 

 

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Debbie Lim

Debbie Lim lives in Sydney. Her poems have appeared regularly in the Best Australian Poems series (Black Inc.) and various anthologies including Contemporary Asian Australian Poets (Puncher & Wattmann). Her chapbook is Beastly Eye (Vagabond Press).

More by Debbie Lim ›

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