Gentle Hands III

She pushed the watermelon between the cornstalks to her father's feet. He looked down and smiled at the sun on her hair. The blood ran down the melon and mixed with the pink juice on the cutting board. She didn't jump or scream, just held the cut palm with her thumb. His lips brushed her thumb, and she closed her eyes. It was time to go, time to leave. It was dark and silent and calm behind her moist eyelids. She dampened the towel and gently wrapped her hand. --She rolled her eyes then raised the corner of her mouth as he tried to make her laugh. That was when they fell in. His life was surrounded by rocking chairs and dreams of "life lived, unwasted." Their skin was within eachother's touch. His heart was ahead of and behind them. Her heart was searching for his with tender fingers. Tender fingers now arthritic and wrinkled. Searching heart now pumping through a cow's valve.-- Anymore she likes salt on her watermelon. And salt on her corn too