The Amputee

[RiverNotch]

The hand stewed
in fever blanket sweat
for months after the operation. I see the phantom of a hand -- not immediately, it took a while to sink in, but that I think is no flaw.

A tingle lingered in its vacuum like the eyes But I do not like "vacuum" here; as much as it reveals that this hand is gone, I think the title works well enough for that, and mentioning vacuum here feels inconsistent, in relation to all the flesh that dominate these first two stanzas. Maybe "muscles"?
of a stranger, and a breeze could chill
the bones in the fingers, sending a hush
upon the itch. I think the fall in rhythm works here, as a sort-of closing off of these first two, "fleshly" stanzas; I also think the image chosen is quite appropriate, if only because I've always wondered if phantom hands truly itch, and this tingles that bit of imagination. Although maybe "an itch", instead?

When the wind died
and the bristles in the trees The wind dying means a loss of that phantom feeling for me, with the bristles in the trees being a tactile contrast.
grew still, I’d think about But I do not like the shift to first person here. The whole poem, bar this, already reads like first person, the sensations are vivid, yet first person in the sense that the speaker, broken by the trauma of losing a hand, is dissociated from himself (or herself, as I first read this). Perhaps something a little more lost, a little less redundant.
their movement.
It's not immediate, sure, but the sympathy is there, and I find that this sort of slow-mounting is more, er, poetic than a right proper gut punch -- it sinks in better, and it doesn't feel manipulative. Although it does start out a slight puzzle, and once the reader overcomes that, certain feelings of pleasure might intrude -- I didn't mind that, but others might. Anyway, lovely work.