Women’s Work

Blue sinks stone wise
as horizon golds,
and I wonder if
in between the colors
you still linger--
if perhaps cold earth
hasn’t yet claimed you
and somewhere a mandolin
still draws your tears.

Generations away
we fold your handiwork
and consider your time,
wondering what patience
gave birth to such beauty.
Your sorrow stitched into shells
row after row, circles widening,
the pattern a geometric marvel
of unschooled hands.

In all of this thread-- inch by inch--
you tied yourself to us and
lost in blue or stone cold
here you live, keeping us warm.