Moonlight on the Windowsill

I see the moonlight 
blank against the windowsill 
sunk into the grains of wood,  
into the etchings of pencils 
and pressed fingernails 
carved 
like insect-scarred walking sticks  
we used to find in the forest,  
and mossy flakes 
from screen windows 
open too long in the summer,  
and they are golden,  
far too golden, 
and I rest my palms there 
just to see the moonlight 
rinse through 
the long-folded lines 
of my hands,  
the opaque crescents 
of each fingernail, 
the veins 
like green islets, 
like oxbow lakes 
removed from the river, 
and I swear I can feel 
the moonlight itself 
felted 
and painfully cold.