My Mother’s Love Sewn into my Jeans
by Julia Wei, Korowa Anglican Girls’ School
Winner, Years 11 – 12, written poetry
I sheepishly shuffle around the corner,
Entrust torn, creased jeans to my mother’s calloused hands
Once more.
An exasperated sigh escapes her as she sits on the edge of the bed
And slips on her well-worn thimble –
Flakes of metal clinging onto a mottled surface
Eroded with age.
Coaxing the thread through the head of the needle –
Effortlessly, with practised ease
She begins to weave the severed stitches of my jeans
Back together.
I’m transfixed by the way her needle
Flits in and out of the fabric
Like water piercing through rice-paper,
Lulled by the glint of her thimble-nestled thumb winking
With the movement of her nimble, dexterous hands.
The tune she hums is the same as ever;
‘Jasmine Flower’
Then just like that I am a child
Once more,
And my mother is sitting there,
Dust dancing in the light shining through the window
As she threads together tears in my
Onesies and
Pyjamas,
Shirts,
Dresses and
Uniforms –
Her frustration silently hidden
Loudly expressed, her love is in
The hours lost,
As her needle swims through fabric, time
And time again.
She hands me my jeans back, and there
Standing out starkly against the dark blue fabric,
Red threads tether the tear together.
“Thank you.”
I say with a lump choked back in my throat,
Because she has entrusted to me
Once more,
Not just a pair of newly mended jeans
But all her love,
Sacrifice,
And heart,
Folded up neatly
In my carelessly reckless hands.
Want to read more poems? Explore the other Years 11 – 12 finalists.