Thread

[everyadventure]

She favored shades of blue:
Cerulean, Robin's Egg, Midnight.
I see her gnarled hands
tie a tidy French knot
forming a songbird's bright eye
in Prussian Blue.

Or perhaps it was the pinks she loved;
only four left…scant strands of Seashell,
Cherry Blossom,
and Pink Champagne
wound sparsely on wooden spools.
She used the Prairie Rose
to embroider strawberries
upon a tea-towel...

Someone--
her daughter-in-law?--
tossed these in a plastic sack,
donated alongside cut-glass candy dishes,
curlers, and cake tins.

I add them to my own collection;
Persimmon cotton and Cocoa carpet thread
nestled amongst my Coats & Clark.
I thread a needle with Prussian Blue
and carry on.

[MystyrMystyry]

Interesting nostalgic imagery for me every - my granny was big on sewing but the skill was lost on my mother (knitted jumpers too short with sleeves impracticably too long and not long enough - fortunately rarely)

But there were these sewing things at granny's house I haven't seen anywhere else, large they were, like treasure chests, with the outside embroidered silks and the inside full of pins and needles and colourful cottons on wooden spools. They were handmade somewhere down the family tree and passed on I guess, because they looked early Victorian rather than Great Depression era, but who can say?

Excellent work!

[Jack of Hearts]

Someone's treasure cast aside as trash but fortunately fallen into the right hands, it seems.

Funny, when things work out like that.





J

[Hawkman]

This is a great poem ea but I'd suggest loosing S1. The list adds nothing to the poem except a delay before it starts. All after S1 is evocative, lyrical and moving.

Live and be well, H

[hallaig]

Lovely and sensual language. Agree with Hawkman on this occasion. Stanza 1 is cumbersome as well as a wee distraction. The rest is beautiful. It is.

[PrinceMyshkin]

"Only connect," advised E.M. Forster, and what better enables us to connect with another or with another time but the particulars! And then the last line here applies not only to whatever task the persona has in mind but the procession of women/craftspeople who came before her. Brava!

[everyadventure]

@Hawkman: Insightful! Consider it lost. You're right, it's considerably better. Thanks!

[IceM]

I've read this three times now, once with the erased first stanza, and twice as is. With your prior first stanza, now erased, your poem reminded me of Sandburg's Chicago Poems, with the disjunct rhythm of related images creating a comprehensive picture.

The color imagery is fantastic, as my day, strictly green, yellow, blue and white (the colors of my surroundings in a country house) has now been introduced to more beautiful, subtle shades of color (Persimmon, Prussian Blue?). Beautiful.

I loved the indecisiveness of this piece. The first line of stanza 2 and the first two of stanza three create an indecisiveness in this reader in determining which colors are most beautiful. Very well done.

Thank you for sharing!

[_Shannon_]

This is truly grand! I love poetry like this...that gives me the pictures...love it.

[everyadventure]

Thanks all! Of course I had to make a special framed wall hanger to display all that lovely vintage thread...