Finger
colored cloth
huipiles, rows of
human blood
stained women’s
fingers toiling
with history and
against hunger,
visible in faces
pallid and listless
look at me and
see white
white white
pink red
skin tender
delicate beware
sun exposure heat
quetzales hot
in my clasp,
body cold
to touch,
belly full
of black beans.
I drop quetzales
in the street
the plaza
the market.
Kids lift
fingers cupped
so tight
I could pour
bottled water
inside
gated courtyard,
separating
hot hands that
graze fat
pockets.

—

Logan Perkes lives in Austin and is a social worker.  She has an MFA in nonfiction and has published essays and poems in many journals,  including Post Road and Third Coast.  Logan loves to travel whenever she can.