One of Those Poems Aging Writers Write

by Donald Judge

I still have the hands of that boy
who did marvelous things--
ran for hours,
built bicycles out of
spare parts,
wrote stories,
hiked a dozen miles in a blizzard
for love. His hands
are my hands. I could show you,
you wouldn’t believe me,
you’d think I’d done it
with moisturizing cream—
I think it’s a miracle,
the way a tall hill is a miracle,
and dreaming, the very weight
of the air,
breasts
leaking milk,
a life that changes.
I don’t look often at my own eyes.
I think I’m afraid of them. Perhaps I should be
drinking, by now, or smoking again,
driving very fast, making loud noises
in restaurants—all the myriad cacophonies of the dying
Bring a stout chair,
I want to sit down.

Donald Judge is 57 years old, lives in Wyoming ("somewhere"), drives a Toyota hybrid, is a vegetarian, single (but, he tells us, is "working hard at finding the right woman, and also working hard waiting for her to find me"), and has published one poetry chapbook, "Middle of the Road Blues," available through Spiny-Wing Press, NYC.