My Granny’s Hands

I have my granny’s hands.

Fingers, long and thin.
Lythe, and graceful.
Deep nail beds that
make for long nails,
even when they’re cut short.

I used to watch her work
Deftly chopping, peeling
Kneading, measuring a pinch
With just her fingers,–

Watching my Granny cook
Was magical.
Growing up beside her
In her tiny kitchen,
I learned how to say
“I love you ” with cookies.
I watched how she made smiles
Out of plates of fudge,
And that the proper cure
For any sick friend
Is a pot of homemade soup.

When I was 14,
she took my hands in hers
And said
“you’re hands are always hot…you have healer’s hands”.
I didn’t know what she meant then,
But I envisioned faith healers
And nonsense.
I thought for a moment she’d gone mad.

Now I know she was saying
“Chrissy, you have my hands”

Sometimes now I watch
My own hands at work
In the kitchen.
A lifetime spent building
Tactile memory,
They just know what to do.
A pinch of this, a dash of that.

A teaspoon measured
In the center of my cupped palm.
My fingers know the dough
Is just hydrated enough,
The apples are juicy enough
To require just so much flour tossed
With them, to make a perfect pie.

They’re my hands,
but they surprise me still.
I marvel at them.
For I know they are also hers.
I watch them dance, gracefully
Through hand-cut, herbed dumplings
And biscuits I’ve known by heart
For thirty years,
Perfectly choreographed
Moving to the rhythm
Of recipes that once lived in her heart,
Passed down to her granddaughter
In an old tin can
Full of clippings from boxes, jars
And magazines, and in her Granny’s hands.

For my Granny, Neva Lee Knight Gough who I miss every day
Chrissy, 2023