The Only Thing to Fear
Juliet t e S e bo c k
When it rains, my hands
stop working;
When it gets hotter or colder,
and snows,
ices over.
Instead, they grasp a stuffed toy from a glass box,
only to drop it and waste Mom’s quarters.
My grandfather’s fingers did too,
arthritis wilting the petals
of a sonnet.
He never writes any more.
I need my hands to see
the world through my keys
or a pen
and the back of a hotel napkin.
I need them to eat
because you can’t get food
if you don’t have someone paying to you to see,
to write,
to read.
Someday, they’ll stop working altogether
and in the moment they stop,
I’ll stop seeing,
eating,
breathing.
32
Cauldron Anthology