The art of Quilting

A quilt, lilac, rose, spring green and cream,
hangs upon our bannister, Her soft hands, smelling of lotion
would have held and smoothed this quilt, cut the cloth and pieced
together the intricate shapes.

For weeks, in every spare minute, she poured her love into the fabric,
until completed and we could all stand back
and admire the finished article.

What a relief then, to hand over to me,
that shabby bundle of mis-matched pieces,
all those contradicting hues and unwieldy ragged edges,
cloth that would not bend to the will,
stitches that unravelled faster than they could be sewn,
A task that would never be completed
or come to any satisfactory conclusion.

How eagerly I reach for it, admiring the softness, the strength,
the unfathomable pattern.
The promise of warmth on the coldest of nights,
how the vibrant, vivid colours dazzle and enchant me,
How I love the quirky shapes and the way he wraps around me, enfolding me, loving me back.

These gifts came together then, from her hands,
from her flesh, her love.
And I wonder... did she know?
in the cherishing of one, I would learn how to complete the other.