Tapestries

Once you sat serenely on terra cotta tile
in the corner of a Tuscan room
white chintz billowing softly at your back
sunlight splaying your floral brocade
oft I curled up within your familiar embrace
bible in my lap
leg thrown over the comfortable fit of your well worn arm
reading
praying
gazing out over sprawling hills
of sunflowers
vineyards
olive groves in turn.

Five children I held
rocked
nursed in you
five others I mourned
sat rocking in solitude
arms wrapped tightly around the ache
in my own hollow abdomen
while burning tears spilled
distorting my vision
as grief is prone to do.

You crossed the wide Atlantic to grace my prairie home
where you snuggled into the corner of a much more homely room...
battered hardwood beneath
and the steady pummeling of many little hands and feet
others less sentimental may have looked on you, chagrined
critical eyes drawn to those tattered tassels
this unsightly tear perhaps
that stubborn stain
But to these sentimental eyes of mine
each worn thread of your tapestry
is gently twined with a fleeting memory

I see my girls
sprawled on the area rug
braiding your silk tassels while I read
my boys years later
snipping mischievously away
scissors in hand
reveling in the "click" and the chords that fell
lifeless to the hardwood
later to be swept up and cast into the fire
like golden locks after a trim

Memories of my children as they napped in you
curled up in my lap on you
climbed
and jumped
and laughed on you.

Your faded tapestry is beautiful in my eyes
interwoven as it is with the tapestry of our lives.


My contribution to L.L. Barkat's poetry prompt at Seedlings in Stone. What timing to be led into the living room this week where I finally retired my beloved and tattered old wingback chair.