We knew her by her hands,
death had done its damnest with every other feature,
collapsed her face to caricature, plastered the hair to her skull.
The hands assured us, carried the familiar toil,
her sprong in the soil, the basin of Kerr Pinks at her hip,
worms and clay in the water,
the way she ran a darning needle under her nails
to dislodge the black dense clog.
We remembered shrivelled finger pads, hands too long in the bath pan
shampoo lathered through our hair,
the fire lit, as red and fair heads bent to the drying spark,
the chaffed palms on wash days: the gouge and ire of harsh detergent.
Hands that heaved furniture to hide the shabby
lino, its pockmarks burnished with lavender polish,
hands that brought the relief of a cigarette to her mouth to calm
the throb of burst fingers, spurting blood.
Her work with scissors, saucepan and shovel, over now,
the stitch, the sift, the shine all evidenced
in her mortuary chapel hands,
waxy hands crossed in improbable repose.
Margaret Galvin writes poetry and prose essays. She lives in Wexford, Ireland. Hre most recent collection is 'Our Hose, Delirious' from Revival Press, Limerick. Her essays are frequently broadcast on national radio in Ireland: RTE Radio 1 on 'Sunday Miscellany' and 'A Word in Edgeways.