QUILTING POETRY

they were just meant as covers
in winters
as weapons
against pounding January winds

but it was just that every morning I awoke to these
October ripened canvases
passed my hand across their cloth faces

and began to wonder how you pieced
all these together
these strips of gentle communion cotton
and flannel nightgowns
wedding organdies
dime store velvets

how you shaped patterns square
and oblong and round
positioned
balanced
then cemented them
with your thread
a steel needle
a thimble

how the thread darted in and out
galloping along the frayed edges,
tucking them in
as you did us at night---

you were the river current
carrying the roaring notes
forming them into pictures of a little boy reclining
a swallow flying

you were the caravan master at the reins
driving your threaded needle
artillery across the mosaic cloth bridges
delivering yourself in separate testimonies

oh mother you plunged me sobbing and laughing
into our past
into the river crossing at five
into the spinach fields
into the plain view cotton rows
into tuberculosis wards
into braids and muslin dresses
sewn hard and taut to withstand the thrashings of twenty-five years

stretched out they lay
armed/ready/shouting/celebrating

knotted with love
the quilts sing on

Theresa Palma Acosta
"My Mother Pieced Quilts"