Tuesday Poem

Bad Thumb

This is the finger crushed

between doors, age six

before mass, offered up

to the god of no ice: thankless, squat, bruised.

The stub scrumbling in loam,

awkward flinger of carrot seeds,

a thousand to the ounce.

This is the pit end of the shovel,

digit no one claims

from the bin of lost appendages,

stump with the spatulate nail, ugly in polish,

begging for a blunt clip.

Never the soft lamb, the silky tip.

Sandpapered, abraded of tissue.

Whorl of a tornado, spiral

of no-good, a print-on-record.

This is the thumb that wouldn’t get a job.

The thumb that finally lowered the shade,

pulled the pin, cocked the hammer.

The thumb that raised itself

roadside, no apologies. Hopped

into a vagabond truck, vanished.

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copyright 2007, T. Clear

originally appeared in Bayou