My Good Hand Plays God



My thumb & index finger
     frame a zero, then an 8

sleeping on its side, & I say,
     Leonardo, show me how

the miraculous scapula
     moves like a torn wing

half-fused, barely unstuck,
     & a life dares to lift off.

Floating rib, boomerang flat—
     if it comes back or not,

I don’t have the stomach
     for doubt & vivisection,

reshaping flesh, muscle,
     & tone into a portrait,

or mock-up of a machine
     glimpsed on the edge

of destiny, a daydreaming
     five hundred years early.

What if, born out of wedlock,
     a silky caul over his face,

Leonardo brushed light under
     skin of oils, science & art.

I could stand like man-X
     moving toward night-

time, feet parted, ready to do
     some one-handed magic,

singing  Judas’s old plea.
     My left hand holds up

a sketch, showing a way—
     good hand & bad hand,

circle half-broken, let there be
     a truce, embrace the fall.

The whole contraption of
     gore & math, just here,

as I go over the blueprint,
     hand raising the brain

to higher order, working
     in the dark, step for step,

hovel to temple, & I draw
     a cross down my chest.
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Written on 2020

Submitted by Drone232 on August 13, 2022

Modified on April 21, 2023

1:08 min read
36

Quick analysis:

Scheme AB CX XD EX XX EB XX XX DF XX AX XX XX FX CX FX XX XX DX XX
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 1,156
Words 229
Stanzas 20
Stanza Lengths 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2

YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA

Yusef Komunyakaa (born James William Brown; April 29, 1941)[1] is an American poet who teaches at New York University and is a member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers. Komunyakaa is a recipient of the 1994 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, for Neon Vernacular[2] and the 1994 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. He also received the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. Komunyakaa received the 2007 Louisiana Writer Award for his enduring contribution to poetry. His subject matter ranges from the black experience through rural Southern life before the Civil Rights era and his experience as a soldier during the Vietnam War. more…

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