Writing hands
An ode to embracing child-like wonder
When did I stop writing on my hands? A rainbow-armed little girl skips past me and my longing for the ephemeral multicolored expressions of my past weighs on me. How they dazzled, flawed yet shameless, as they sang fragments of songs, guarded girlhood secrets, kept tabs of tasks forgotten as soon as the ink was erased. In this idyllic secret garden where I sit on a bench with my book and children play, my eyes burn and I wish I had the guts to throw myself on the chalk-covered floor, to scream and cry and roll in it until my whole body was swallowed by multicolored madness. Why did I ever stop daubing myself with color? The sky is overcast to match the pavement now, but the children’s wild color touch persists. The icy, rapid gusts cannot carry their laughter away; and their bright eyes gently picking up a trampled flower can teach me a thing or two about finding the lovely glow in a partly cloudy sky. I think I’ll start writing on my hands again, even if it’s just with a pen.