There is a web of posts and poems currently in bloom, emerging from a pendant by Elise Matthesen. A tendril by Dichroic clung to my mind's ghost after I read it earlier today, as did the images of the pendant itself. So, a first draft:

What Price for Balance?

You do not need ten fingers to walk on your hands.
You can gather cobwebs to stanch the bleeding.
What are you willing to pay for a lantern?

You do not need nine fingers to conquer a violin.
Your pride can pluck notes out of the thinnest air.
What are you willing to play for a comet?

You do not need eight fingers to shoot a gun,
but your weariness will outrace your hunger.
What are you willing to glean from strangers?

You do not need seven fingers to sketch a map.
You do not need six to hoist a black sail.
You do not need five to wear a queen's ransom.
Four is sufficient for gesturing to owls,
and three to please a lover (provided
you haven't yet bartered away what wit
and patience you earned enroute).

Sans nine, sans all? Present to me your palm.

~ pld