Saturday, December 18
STAY TENDER SOMEHOW Dina writes, and I pick up my pencil. I wish I could call the place it comes to rest, the small and grooved knob on my fourth finger, a cradle but it is a callus, stubborn as an uncooked lentil. I think about my grandmother's sleeping gloves, about how my aunt could not be entirely gentle jimmying her mother's embalmed fingers into their silk, appointed tunnels, saying She never slept soundly without them. I think about the tiny mitts that keep infants from scratching their faces, about how my sons napping in summer looked like prize-fighters felled--high-waisted diapers and flimsy shorts, hands balled inside gauntlets. Some blessings fire and backfire so sweetly. Stay tender is one. (Jane Zwart)