Clipper Ship on Stormy Seas
Round bales of wool cut into two and a half inch segments
Grouped by color, wrapped and numbered, filling a box
One by one, given a new home on the canvas
Fold over hook, insert, loop, pull, and adjust
Space by space, row by row, color by color
Move on to the next row
Compulsion, obsession, suppression
Fear of stopping drives the progress
A world of people, places and things
Waits patiently for the hook to be put down
Keep moving until the fingers are raw
Seventeen days later and almost done
Fighting through blisters, cuticles bloody
Loose wool lint coating clothes, chair, and floor
Began with the sky, ending with the green-blue sea
Light and dark and dark greens, creamy foam topped waves rolling past
A small JC in the bottom corner finished off the piece
Withdraw preserved in strands of wool
Mounted on the wall to always remember
The pain of beginning a new life with choice
A clipper ship on stormy seas now safe at port
A move and then another, a couple more to come
Its new residence, a shelf in my parent’s basement – forgotten
Cardboard boxes are never safe in floodwaters – everything ruined
Decades later another flood and the need for repairs
Demanded the first floor be cleared, boxed and stored
And there on the top shelf of the hallway closet it sat
Folded, safe and sound, the colors just as bright
The first seventeen days of my new life preserved
Strand by strand, hook by hook, fingers raw by nightfall
The sinking ship that was my life prior, reprogrammed
Thirty-five years later, still sailing along with choice
Row by row, hook by hook, day by day
The years line up and life takes on an image
Gratitude for the reminder of what was lost, then found
Words into Reactions 