Lyrics Hands - Tank and the Bangas

I spent an hour watching the way people hold hands,
The way palms meet palms
The intricacy of fingers laced around other fingers
Like a fine stitching around some foreign(?) fabric
I spent an hour watching hands,
The first was a young couple,
I watched the way his hand waited in the air
Hers complacent to her side
I watched as he grabbed hers,
Locked it around his fingers like an overprotective father holds on
To the innocence of his daughter and just like the
Overbearing of a father and the
Rebellion of a child, she was resistant
Held his only for a moment and then she would let go
She did this at least several times
I would laugh in my mind but soon it was not so funny
The way her fingers would drop his after holding them
So quickly, never tightly, never did she hold his back
I could just imagine how much she was holding back
He never got the hint though,
He just kept finding her fingers locking them in his grip
It let me know he was in love... alone,
This woman and this man let me know that their entire
Relationship could be summed up in
The way she kept letting go of his hands
Soon, there was another set of fingers and thumbs
Mid twenties
I could tell by the entanglement of nubs (?
) That they were still new in love,
Hands dangling in the air,
Swaying backwards and forwards like swings, like not a care
Something about the swaying and the way they held each other′s
Hands let me know that it wasn't so serious, but it was getting there
I watched them,
I could tell by the lightness in the grasp that if
She wanted to go there, he was just as ready as her hands
Third couple
I could see the possession in his middle finger,
I could see the same hands he used to hold hers
Presently maybe had been across her face before
The same fingers that were tied into a knot around hers had
Simultaneously been around her neck.
I could see the excuses she made for him in the way she bit her
Fingernails.
It let me know that she grew her patience in other places
I never looked at her face, but I could see the rock in her palm,
I could see the ownership in his fist
Because he never held her hand, he carried her wrist
Third couple wasn′t a couple at all.
It was one set of hands, her companion was her cell phone
She was not connected to another human at this present moment,
She was busy showing her attachment to an iphone,
Texting fingers probably wishing they
Were touching another humans collarbone
There was a young man, a stranger, a drifter
Fingernails filled with all the dirty
Things people in subways forgot on their seats
Palms crammed with excuses for spare change,
Fingers long as the highways I'm sure he's walked on
He tells her that he′s heading to Alabama,
He doesn′t ask for change,
She's surprised,
He extends his hand,
She is as hesitant with her life
Jacket as a Christian to a Jehovah′s witness
Finally, she latches on
Her grasp is faint, her grip is weak,
Wipes her hand on her black book sack
After he leaves, stains won't show there
The fourth set of hands were my favorite,
They were different from the rest,
Hands were creased like the ones in his
Pants and were filled with lines like maps,
I′m thinking,
I'm thinking they show where they′ve been
He would occasionally lift hers to his mouth
To taste the sweetness of their time together,
They walked slow,
Their hands did not fidget,
Never uncomfortable with the little
Space or the silence that was between them,
They held each other with such a closeness,
I could not tell where their hands begin and end
Only to swing them while they walked
They were comfortable with the certainty of their journey,
They were in this together
Not letting you slip through my hands
Wrapped around each others triggers,
Old in age, twisted in skein and poem and fingers
There was something about the way their hands were as certain as
Their steps together,
Interwoven like fabric, hands entwined like the material in sweaters
I watched them the longest
I thought that
I thought that I could learn the way to hold on from them
Thought that
Thought that maybe the secret to
Longevity was hidden in the maps in their hands
And that maybe,
Just maybe I wouldn't be the girl that
Let go of that stranger's hand so quickly
If I take your hand in mine, would you let go or hold on for sure?
I′m waiting at the bus stop, tell me will it stop for me, or go...