I used to be unafraid
of holding: would catch minnows 

with my bare hands, waist-deep 

in Sand Lake. Child fingers 

unabashed like ruddy eaglets, 

snapping gleefully to feed
my yellow bucket homeschool. 

Something changed
by the time I met the parakeet. 

She thrummed on my finger, 

heart like a little wind-up
toy, and for the first time
I was afraid of killing. 

 

Why won't you touch me, 

she would ask me again, 

and instead of lying
I would say her name
like some kind of 

substitutionary atonement. 

Easier than saying 

I've scaled too many
lovebound salmon,
pinched too many antgirls
into black-blue dreaming
to trust my hands with
peace. You don't know me.
You don't know that I was built 

in the hands of a fisherman, 

wicked fingers baited with 

gospel, taught second-nature
the required energetic processes 

for life. My Chinese grandmother 

greets us with Have you eaten? 

Leads us deeper into the house 

where my father, as a child, 

lost all his milk teeth at once. 

 

I am at the aquarium.
She is gentle and asks me
to stroke the anemone with her. 

Feel the way it stings.
I am reaching into the water
and I am touching. I am touching. 

I am touching.