Thumb's Witness

The raised skin, pale and hard,

on the side of my right thumb.

Where the pen sits, day after day, a guard

against friction, against the becoming numb.

It's a small plateau, smooth like worn stone,

a secret history nobody sees.

A thousand words, a hundred miles alone

with a wheel, a quiet, slow disease

of constant touch. It doesn't hurt, just is.

A thickened spot, a kind of shield,

proof of what the body remembers, its

small, quiet wisdom, hard-won, revealed.