Best Darning Poems
The cat sat on the windowsill,
And stirred a little in his sleep.
Each breath a cloud upon the glass
And outside the snow was falling fast
The children all went out to play,
But he couldn’t be bothered to move today.
The radiator hummed, and the woman hummed,
And the cat hummed in his sleep.
And all about the little house,
The snow was getting deep.
The woman sat beside the fire,
And sung a merry little tune.
As she sung, back and forth she rocks,
Darning a pair of colorful socks.
Her hair is turning silver-gray,
But you’d never believe she had aged a day
Since she and the cat and a box full of shoes
Came to the house on the dune.
And all about the little house,
The snow reflected the moon.
...inspired by 'Cul-De-Sac' by Allen Tate
The golden sheen had turned to rust,
the laughter to a pile of rags,
the joy to ghostly lamentations,
how the weighted second drags.
Blind and deaf to consecration,
weak the beatings of the heart,
barren now what once was fertile,
love's become a dying art.
The chasm of their lives together
broadens with each passing day,
echoes barely audible
now rattle in a death-mask play.
He spends his time in retrospection,
trying to ignite the flame,
all the tinder is but ashes,
all their tenderness a game.
Passing in the hallway, they will
glance away in silent grief,
post-it notes and conversations
miss their mark, the practised thief.
He concerns himself with models,
crafting planes no one will see,
for an unborn son or daughter,
generations not to be.
Would a child have made a difference?
(would that he were strong and able),
tiny sneakers, matching socks,
another place to set at table.
Living with an empty feeling,
she tries not to blame or doubt,
busies with the darning, dusting,
looking for a quick way out.
Finances keep them together,
stocks and bonds, annuities,
the only glue that holds the airplane,
slim and thin prosperities.
Fifty years, and inching slowly,
they will not be One with God,
separate, they make arrangements,
he cremated, she to sod.
There was happiness and laughter,
lo, those many years ago,
back before they wanted children,
the physician told them no.
They are dead and gone, I'll warrant,
separate, and in repose,
Heaven opened, they crossed inward,
What they said? God only knows.
...inspired by 'Cul-De-Sac' by Allen Tate
The golden sheen had turned to rust,
the laughter to a pile of rags,
the joy to ghostly lamentations,
how the weighted second drags.
Blind and deaf to consecration,
weak the beatings of the heart,
barren now what once was fertile,
love's become a dying art.
The chasm of their lives together
broadens with each passing day,
echoes barely audible
now rattle in a death-mask play.
He spends his time in retrospection,
trying to ignite the flame,
all the tinder is but ashes,
all their tenderness a game.
Passing in the hallway, they will
glance away in silent grief,
post-it notes and conversations
miss their mark, the practised thief.
He concerns himself with models,
crafting planes no one will see,
for an unborn son or daughter,
generations not to be.
Would a child have made a difference?
(would that he were strong and able),
tiny sneakers, matching socks,
another place to set at table.
Living with an empty feeling,
she tries not to blame or doubt,
busies with the darning, dusting,
looking for a quick way out.
Finances keep them together,
stocks and bonds, annuities,
the only glue that holds the airplane,
slim and thin prosperities.
Fifty years, and inching slowly,
they will not be One with God,
separate, they make arrangements,
he cremated, she to sod.
There was happiness and laughter,
lo, those many years ago,
back before they wanted children,
the physician told them no.
They are dead and gone, I'll warrant,
separate, and in repose,
Heaven opened, they crossed inward,
What they said? God only knows.
"Those were better times. Good times!
Being round my grands…
It reminds me of my grandparents;
Grandma, baba, ouma, bomma grandmother;
Love to read poems sing them ole time songs;
So much love they given each of us;
Those were better times. Good times!
Being round my grands…
Yet they were stern
Great teachers taught my parents as will as me to learn;
They listened to a Motorola on a tall stand;
Nonna would play a little ditty on the “baby grand”
Oh! And Gran made fried pies on Sundays;
Those were better times. Good times!
Being round my grands…
We would have with our dinner;
Homemade chicken soup, meatloaf and cabbage loaf;
My grandpa and his friends would sit outside talkN loud
While listening to the ballgame on a transmitter radio;
The ladies would settle in the den;
Nesting caressing darning with patch qulits using needles and tread;
Joyously giggling laughing while lovingly talkN bout them men;
Those were better times. Good times!
Being round my grands…"
1/4/20
Written words by Genysis DMaurier & James Edward Lee Sr. 2020©
A dedicated verse to Genysis DMaurier
based on words from Genysis to a e-mail to me
Dark slide grind
Skating around issues
Breaking ice around in spheres
Wearing gaudy skirts that sparkle
In the wind
People never believe things until
It’s the end
What will it take to convince?
Social issues don’t mean a thing if there is no world to have them in
Politics and latest fashions are useless since,
It takes more then enough time to win
Affections of green paper and greedy oil corporations
Expansions, folding of ill-will and shady ways
Consciences are thin, now-a-days
It's a lot easier to ignore and deny
Then to right oneself and imply
Goodness to the World
If I put all these facts into a binder, present them in a sense
Of pure simplicity and smack-you-in-the-face
reality
Would you still deny the fact that we are becoming past tense
Killing what makes us real in the first place, Certainty
Isn’t what it was, anymore
Dashboards won’t save human ideas and massive clots of minds
Darning of holes in layers unknown can’t stop Mother Earth exploding from it’s
core
At times, it’s really not that easy to ignore
the signs
_____
Global Warming, it’s Happening. Let's Join Together and Do Something About It.
She holds it in her little hand,
the arm of her friend, Teddy Bear.
It had finally been torn off,
from what started as a little tear.
Her tear streaked cheeks say it all,
her world has come to an end.
This tragedy must be reversed,
we must get Teddy on the mend.
Tongue stuck out the side of her mouth,
she helps thread the darning needle.
Bright red wool to do the job.
In her arms, Teddy, she cradles.
With each stitch, she pats Teddy's arm,
cooing reassuring words,
Telling him how brave he is.
It's the sweetest thing I've ever heard.
With a flourish, I place the last stitch,
a band-aid and healing kiss.
Then, off they go to new adventures,
Teddy Bear and my Little Miss.
I WISH I'D LEARNED TO SEW
I wish I’d learned to sew
My mother asks me how
How I’ve survived till now…
I tell her I don’t know
I’m feeling so forlorn
My socks got old and worn
So I’ve thrown them in the bin
I cannot take it in
And yes I know how cold my toes will be
Those socks were so lovely
Now my feet feel so chilly
I'm sad my darning skills have let me down
And now my feet are icy
(Original lyrics were written by Don Mclean)
******
A tribute to my penguin socks
I’ve walked all over you, but that’s all in the past
I knew that our relationship wasn’t strong enough to last
You’d always been part of a matching pair
But the thinning fabric I can no longer repair
I’m finding it extremely difficult to finally let go
But the hole in my heel was just too huge to sew
I’ve had this pair of socks for about 4 years thye were my absolute favourite ones and had cute penguins on the them… but the threads were so worn so thin they have disintegrated and yesterday my heel went through and they cannot be repaired and are now confined to the waste bin … its poetic licence about not being able to sew as I have mended them many times in the past
11-16-17
by the time you've read this
i'm afraid our ships may have
already boarded i do hope
you are not to ravished about
our departure truly you and i both
know it tis for the best why going over
this blatantly i'm surely open
to explore other options
why the writer's block being stricken
with only notions above a sullen
romance novel my skin crawls
as my pen stroll over the pages
dainty an yet a more masculine style
as well not drawing to much fame
among what westerns might see
as lyrical cynical chants of breathless
panting i was being smothered
darning socks at old abe's cabin
all the fixings for boredom my mind
has marveled in more subtle
glory day's of war and peace and love
tainted you know full well tainted
only above corruptions sphere
what are we but man to fear not
human emotions as i blend morale
simplicity to bind just so while
summer continues setting over the niles
let us wave goodbye to august again
How to
Capture
Between pages
Or pixels
Or caught between
Stitches
Do memories catch
Between the threads?
Does love
Linger in the ink?
One can pray
In the silence
Where laughter once rang
Find the steady beat
Of a sewing machine
Where your heart used to beat
Trying to sew
Myself back together
If I just keep
Sewing
From the heart
I can bind
My heart up
Fit pieces together
Here is where it tore
When Elisif’s laugh was lost
Here when Phil’s light went out
And here, this big one
When my grandfather died
These old stitches are fraying
Starting to come undone
Here the slapdash job
From when Jackie put a gun to her head
Here from Steve being ripped away
So suddenly
This bit holds up well
For an eight year old’s
Handiwork
And here a spot needs darning
My heart is worn
It needs
Many a repair
But I have little time
For the careful stitching
Of so many holes
Yet they wont
Close
On their own
So I keep busy
With fabric patches
deeper-day-dreaming.
was he not a confident lover?
disheveled-darning-dominant.
confidence is not letting what may be disheveled in you get so deep that it dominates
so by day, be daring.
dream.
he transformed into all she needed.
he was all she needed.
cliched or not, it all happened for them overnight.
he made his great-grandparents proud
after explaining "what you felt in that moment"
A stilled summer sky saturated and scattered with god song
watches a way fared soldier - whispers to a wary widow.
Creamy clouds canopy the concord of a moment. Minutes become
mercurial - they manifest and meander as the seconds slip by.
Sailboats slice through streams of idle indigo.
A ripple somersaults and softly settles into serenity.
Cooing couples cuddle near clusters of cockscomb.
A lass lightheartedly leaps. A comely colleen crochets -
moment by moment - darning daydreams into days.
Parisians promenade past a proficient painter’s palette.
Social classes collide amidst color and contour and calm.
A smorgasbord of strangers isled and idyllic - spruce a
stippled sanctioned salver, as sanguine seconds smoothly
sweep past the subtle, symphonic swells of the Seine.
When Death Calls
Death comes calling in the early morning
No one is at home
They have all gone fishing
Personally, I prefer doing the dishes
Cleaning the litter box
Darning sox
Those darn socks
I prefer doing that than being damned and dead
When death comes calling
The fairies of chaitra
lie on the un–wrinkled bed
with their backside up
in the hearsay of the air
once the woods of tamarisks
once the hill of paraffin
it appears there is no interruption
to this circus
the toy-telephones
hang from the cloud to cloud
from that carnival
take birth many kanthali-champa
the surgeon comes calmly
to the secret of darning
all localities are totally maddened
by the flow tide of the exudation
observing all those happenings
the half-broken wave
does awake on the sofa-set
Years ago, when socks had holes,
A housewife would start sewing.
She would try to nip that rip
Before it started growing.
Darning was a nifty skill
Among her many duties.
She’d mend all the clothes, from coats
To tiny baby booties.
Folks today don’t have the time
Or skill or inclination
To make repairs on clothing;
It’s not worth the aggravation.
So when a toe pokes through a hole,
Most people will not stitch it.
It’s easier, by far, to shrug it off
And simply ditch it.
It seems a waste, but after all
This life just overflows
With items that we use and toss –
That’s just the way it goes.
A housewife from the past
Would cluck her tongue and think it rash
To take a sock with one small hole
And toss it in the trash.
But that’s just what I did today;
And though I am aware
I could have darned that hole, instead
I’ll buy another pair!
When I was young, a dining needle
Was the term we used
To name a flying insect, but
Turns out we were confused.
For darning needle is another
Phrase for dragonfly.
If you see one up close, then you
Will know the reason why.
Its thin and tapered body looks
Like what we’d use to sew,
But “darning” is a word that many
People do not know.
And so a word misheard became
A means of us defining
The dragonfly, which we assumed
Was out to do some dining.