I'm not exciting, not terribly memorable--
even my body seems to know this.
So if my face is marred beyond recognition
in some freak accident
and they need to identify me,
I'm letting you know now--
I don't have any tattoos,
just take my right hand and turn it palm up,
find the mole there.
That's my most unique feature,
a boring mole on my right palm
that's lost its pigment over the years.
This mole is the way I learned right from left as a kid,
like when playing the childhood game Twister.
I'd look down at my palm to see
if it did or didn't have the spot.
This became a habit, checking my palm
for any directional situation.
By comparison, my left palm is smooth.
I'm left-handed, by the way,
and thinking about it now, it's so fitting:
I'm not exciting, even my body knows this,
and though my handedness makes me a minority,
I have learned to identify myself
by the hand without, as the one marked
by the lacking.
--Ellen H.
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