poetry
Needlework
by Ernesto Superal Yee
(for Mom Edith)
A man is only as good
as what he loves.
- Saul Bellow
Here is the mind’s quiet
Invention: needle and thread
Upon thread in
Their measured spaces
Fixed places.
Here is the girl
(Eager as her mother)
Learning the craft
Of doing and undoing;
Piercing into the cloth
Familiar beginnings
Landscape budded
By prick and scission.
Between her sure
Eye and nimble fingers:
Silver needle and heart’s
Patience cross-
Stitching the breath-
Less life of
Living colors.
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