Day 402

No one can find who this small child
belongs to.  No one
knows her name, or how
she happened to lose her hand.
The family who took her in
from the hospital
has tried every name they know
to see if she shows a response.
So far, nothing.  They’ve named her
for a cousin of theirs who was killed.
Daily they teach her how to live
with one hand and no parents.
Her other hand drifts
in a world of dream and memory.
It knows who she is.  She strokes
her mother’s cheek with it, holds
a strand of her sister’s hair.  At night
it finds her, visits her in her sleep.
Settles in.  Waves goodbye
to everything that’s missing.