Almost in Secret by Pamela Rachel Calverley

Almost in secret, she hoards scraps of fabric, old and new.

She dreams of the colours she will put together,

How the colours and textures speak to each other,

How one colour cannot exist without other colours,

And how a colour is renewed by every other colour it meets.

She dreams and waits, and when there is time,

Quilts appear bit by bit; new garments emerge fully formed

And old, worn things are made serviceable again.

The repairs appearing like embellishments.

Almost ashamed, he brings a girl to his flat.

This one dreams of the life they will have together,

How their house will be like the ones in magazines,

How it will be minimalist, crisply designed, in neutral shades

And how she’ll be the envy of her friends.

He works and plays, and when he is tired,

The quilt his mother sent him keeps him warm.

The cushion and the throw she made cheer the student sofa

And their colours challenge the city’s gloomy greyness.

Almost boastful, mother details his progress, grades and girls.

She dreams of the life he is making for himself,

How his work will satisfy him and pay the bills

How he will find a woman to love him and be loved

And how he will learn and grow in wisdom.

She wonders at his talents, and is amazed

That such an ordinary person could produce such a son.

“He works so hard”, she tells her friends.

She can’t imagine where his creativity came from.

Author Bio: Pamela is an immigrant. Her life turned upside-down when she got the chance to go back and choose a different forking path than the one she chose when she was a teenager. She abandoned the slow, peaceful journey towards retirement that she had embarked on in the North of England and came to New Zealand to start a new, and creative life.

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Linkedin: (65) Pamela (Singleton) Calverley | LinkedIn.