Descendant


           Of the Woodland Period, Fully Hafted


In a Virginia cave
it lay perhaps a thousand years
buried in sand, until that summer day
my father held it in his hands.
Only fourteen, he was dumbstruck,
aware of  history,  knowing the ax
as something too valuable to lose.

When he was nearly ninety,
I asked him to will it to me.
He said, "Things have a way
of getting away from us.
Take it now."
His arthritic hands, large-knuckled,
looked like any caveman's.
We both clasped cold stone,
and time was no more than a long scroll,
unwinding thousands of years.
"I wonder how many hands have held this," I said,
and felt the sting of tears.  Esau and Isaac,
the passing of a blessing. . .
ours, a kind of ritual of its own.

Now he is gone, and I hold the ax,
see blue-veined, thin-skinned,
gentle hands, awkward, nervous hands,
fingers once stained by nicotine,
always moving as he told his tales.
Beyond his hands are others,
greasy, dark and scarred, and mine
overlapping.  I hear the long howl
of wolves, hungry beneath the shadows
of trees, see their matted coats
in dim light, knowing the solid weight
could fend off whatever moved.

Carved in little triangles here and there,
ticks that measured time
decorate the dark surface,
time that passed until it wore the ax
to half its length. Outliving the dust of men,
bison, wolves, and wolverine, it rests now
as I lift it to the light and ponder
past and future, all those hands,
all we keep, all we pass on.

Sue Scalf