You Begin

Once you have learned these words you will learn that there are more words than you can ever learn. The word hand floats above your hand like a small cloud over a lake. The word hand anchors your hand to this table your hand is a warm stone I hold between two words.

This is your hand, these are my hands, this is the world, which is round but not flat and has more colours than we can see.

It begins, it has an end, this is what you will come back to, this is your hand. MARGARET ATWOOD is a Canadian poet and novelist who is also known for her literary criticism and environmental activism. She won the Booker Prize for The Blind Assassin and holds honorary degrees from Oxford University and Cambridge University.