Clean Hands poem.

CLEAN HANDS

The soap in my grandmother’s
bathroom dish was misshapen.
A malformed Easter egg with
multicolored lumps and cracks.
Daily dirt ran through pink, blue
and white. The mark of a boy
before mealtime.

I never liked the makeshift bar
of soap, until time and wear
made it smooth. The form
eventually felt good in
and around my hands.

But, just as the soap was getting
right, someone would add more
bits and pieces to the existing
concoction. It was soon back
to being irregular and bumpy.

I often wondered if part of that first
block of Ivory was still inside the
swirls of colors. A minute speck
of what used to be wrapped
in clean, fresh paper.

No matter how nubby the soap
felt or how bad it looked,
it always smoothed down.
Hands of a family.
The multicolored
form’s wholeness shining again.

Janet Brice Parker, 2004