Why I Attend the Evening Quilting Session

Rainwater spills from the spouting—
I hear it splashing at the edge of the garden
as bleak afternoon wanders slowly
into night—the water finds its level

drop over drop near the waiting hydrangeas,
wet with wild blooms as meaningless
as quick-sprung words; the bougainvillea
begin to drape their green-white petals
over the stone fence. My eyes soak up their

rain-wet branches, soddy and glistening
with slick tongues. These blooms, these
saturated branches, these gleaming brown
stems—smooth and jealous for touch.
I touch and hold this sin-quickened day
thwarting my boredom for an instant,
as I await dark night.

Held in a circle, we stitch without words.
The rhythm of the stitches, the quiet
pushing forward, the penetration
through all three layers—the relief
in the repetition. We consider the whole

of the quilt handing our personal squares
to one another. The patchwork
of the garden enters the quilt, its colors
variegated to catch our moods—cotton
squares laid side-by-side yield the common

effort. Like a star displayed at a center, the quilt
has formed a whole—and the whole is
perhaps quilt, perhaps sisterhood, perhaps
memory of a wet garden.