Your Hands by Gevorg Emin
I’m generally leery of translated poems, but I really like this one, and can only hope that it’s true to the original. It’s so simple, but says so much, especially in the final image of the pearl.
Your Hands
By Gevorg Emin (translated by Diana Der Hovanessian)
I love your hands
which hold me,
held me,
for so many years
without
binding me,
hands which make
me master
without mastering me,
encircle
without
strangling me,
lift me
the way the drowning
man is lifted,
hands
whose cupped shells
change me
slowly slowly
into the pearl
they wanted
all the time.
