Summer Quilt

My response to dVerse Poets Pub 5 Year Celebration Part 1, Catching Up with Brian Miller also shared on Imaginary Garden with Real Toads Tuesday Platform

 

Every year,

My grandmother

Aired the hand sewn

Summer quilt and placed

It on my childhood bed.

On sunny Sunday

Mornings, we traced

A patchwork journey,

Each square a story

Of the child my mother used to be,

Long before she belonged to me.

 

© Kim M. Russell, 2016

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47 thoughts on “Summer Quilt”

  1. How lovely to hear the stories of the patchwork journey Kim. I would love to know my mother and father long before they had me too. Thanks for joining us and hope to see you for the next few days.

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  2. Good to see you! I just love that pic of you and your mom. My grandmother used to do the same thing with me and quilts she had made. We learn much of parents through such tales, before they were parents.

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  5. That’s interesting..
    i never thought about it
    but neither Grandmother
    offered any insight at
    all about father or
    mother
    in personal
    way away from
    them.. surely
    that is a nice
    connection
    to know
    what one’s parents
    parents fElt of Them..
    and i never met either
    Grandfather.. but fortunately
    one was an author and an
    X-Catholic priest who literally
    left a published book behind
    named a ‘Soul of a Priest’..
    it was good to get to
    know and feel
    him.. as he
    died some
    10 years before
    i was born.. the power
    of words that last can
    never be underestimated
    in human terms lasting longer
    than even deaths of days before..:)

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    1. My grandparents are all long dead, too, but I still have strong, clear memories mainly, I think, because I lived with my maternal grandparents until I was seven. Sadly, mum has dementia. I visited her for an hour on Sunday and I’m not sure if I’ll get to see her again, she is so frail and so far away.

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  14. oh….I love the picture and the poem. This carries such lovely memories….
    I’ve always admired those who quilt — it takes such painstaking detail and perseverance and patience. There is true love sewn into these wonderful collages so many times of memories — pieces of cloth from clothes long gone, from times long past. Beautifully said here. And did you know that Viv was a quilter? So you’ve given a beautiful poem here that is also related to her life.

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    1. Thank you for reading and for your kind comments. I have to admit that when the idea started to germinate, I had Viv in mind, as I knew she was a quilter. A very good friend of mine is a master quilter in the Irish guild, and my nan patchworked and sewed clothes – she was once a royal seamstress. I loved that old patchwork quilt.

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    1. I know of a local quilting group and there is a weaving community attached to our village hall that I’ve thought about joining – if only I could find the time!

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  17. Love the idea of viewing our mothers as children and how they “belong” to us — the before and after. This is both memory and story — my grandmothers also quilted, embroidered, sewed – sadly I don’t know of any in my generation in my family that know those arts. Thank you for sharing a beautiful, nostalgic poem..

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