Seamlines
The stitches could have been torn out one by one but there were too many
to count and so tight one to the next
The ripper small and sharp
My hands small and pink
The tiniest mistakes can derail
The foot on the pedal
The speed of the needle
When I sewed on the pocket straight
through the back of the shorts
It was too much to imagine getting past
short-sheeted, hemmed in
My fingertips would never slide
into that pocket
My feet would never slip through center
to the cold basement tiles below
Righting this listing ship was far beyond the grasp
of hands that could scarcely hold
the weight of pinking shears
A first and last sewing project
folded, tucked and hidden
back in my mother’s deep basket
after the cutting and the pinning to pattern
after the chalk marks
after laying the pieces back-to-back
the puckered green and white stripes of seersucker
promising summer at water’s edge
All possibilities truncated by an errant seam
And now, I wonder, why didn’t I ask for help?
My mother, who could design and line
a chocolate-brown velvet cape
with flowing pink satin and drape it
around my scant shoulders
She might have said, Honey it’s not so hard.
Your fabric is beautiful and if you can just—
The shorts will fit just—
But we were not practiced at admitting
mistakes in my family
or asking where things had gone
There must be a special heaven
for unfinished sewing projects
And my mother, waiting there, ripper in hand
– Moira Trachtenberg