Writers Hands Poem by Lesley Taylor

Her nails soft and chewed
graphite nestled deeply and
ink blotched on fingertips
calloused and cut in the battle
of delivering words to paper.
scar dark and shining deeply where
pressed into slender fingers
and holding, as if a cup, a pen.
and the pen, knowledge,
and the knowledge, beauty,
and the beauty, pain.
the power of mankind woven snugly
and sharp lines of words chiseled
into open palms, concentrated in fingers,
and plied and formed by pencil,
scratching deeply their marks on
eggshell paper, crisp and sharp,
in a poets weathered hands
marked by invisible glory
dwelling in tired fingerprints