Pinking Shears
about names / saw-toothed and biting / how language / is like a thread / or how language / is either what / cuts or the cut / itself / I am / cutting the linen / edges frayed / but less so / metallic yawn / like how / to pink / once meant / to pierce or stab / and later to decorate / but also the flower Dianthus / which is a family / of carnations / scalloped edges / and dots of / half-closed / eyes / and pink / has been / a boat / a fish / something / small something / excellent / with / these scissors / at least there is / less lost / a small eye / the fish / the stabbing / of the body / and the word / the new thing / about to be / made
While improperly darning a hole in my son’s new red sweater
I start with YouTube videos because I want
to get this right, to learn competence as love.
I’m learning to fix this scar, starting
a quarter inch away from the hole, repair
anchored in what hasn’t yet unraveled, guiding
the needle through loops of knit before I turn
and weave vertically, tiny checkboard whole.
He’s always loved red, one of the first colors
infants can see, one of the first colors
used in art. Past red, we can’t see color, though
we feel them, infrared and hot, something like
yearning. My first mistake involves the knot. No,
my first mistake is my choice of needle, which is
wrong. Then the knot. I’m using thread instead
of yarn, but I go on anyway. He loves red
like armor, his bureau drawers full of fire, what
he chooses over and over. I close the video.
There are times I have been brave,
but I don’t know how to pretend to know
what is best. I prick my finger, drop of blood
(if it was there at all) invisible, in this patch
I create to cover the gap. I’m not fixing a scar
after all. No, I’m making the scar itself, mapping
that which has been lost, acknowledging what is left.
He just wants the sweater back. Later,
we’re sitting at the table and he runs his thumb
over and over the patch, touching it without
thinking, a good luck charm, so sure I did it right.