The Gift

To pull the metal splinter from my palm

my father recited a story in a low voice.

I watched his lovely face and not the blade.

Before the story ended, he’d removed

the iron sliver I thought I’d die from.

I can’t remember the tale,

but hear his voice still, a well

of dark water, a prayer.

And I recall his hands,

two measures of tenderness

he laid against my face,

the flames of discipline

he raised above my head.

Had you entered that afternoon

you would have thought you saw a man

planting something in a boy’s palm,

a silver tear, a tiny flame.

Had you followed that boy

you would have arrived here,

where I bend over my wife’s right hand.

Look how I shave her thumbnail down

so carefully she feels no pain.

Watch as I lift the splinter out.

I was seven when my father

took my hand like this,

and I did not hold that shard

between my fingers and think,

Metal that will bury me,

christen it Little Assassin,

Ore Going Deep for My Heart.

And I did not lift up my wound and cry,

Death visited here!

I did what a child does

when he’s given something to keep.

I kissed my father.

Li-Young Lee (he/him)

is an acclaimed poet and author of collections including The Invention of the Darling (2024), The Undressing (2018), and Behind My Eyes (2009). He has received the 2024 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, multiple Pushcart Prizes, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the Academy of American Poets.

Lee’s poetry often explores memory, family, spirituality, and gratitude, blending personal experience with elemental and natural imagery. Born in Jakarta, Indonesia, to Chinese parents, Lee’s family immigrated to the United States in 1964. He studied with Gerald Stern at the University of Pittsburgh and has taught at universities including Northwestern and Iowa. He lives in Chicago.