An ekphrastic poem is inspired by a work of art. “Woven Thoughts” is inspired by Jacob Lawrence’s 1946 painting, The Seamstress.
I must not let hate | get in the way of my own dream. Sewing clothes | has been my dream. This machine will | make me live my dream. This machine will | take me closer to my dream. Dream, but I am | woke, designing, sewing, alt'ring, sitting now hours, weeks | and months and more I yearn to spend with string and buzzing, scissors | sculpting fabric, pushing pedal, joining islands. I shan't fear of | red from that lil' anvil for it only seeks to stitch. For I need to | make my stitches cleaner; Here it goes I | push the fabric to the buzzing little anvil. Hearing buzzing | little anvil waits to strike and pierce to join Power the machine and put the thread; I must get the job done. Fearing getting 'paled but, It'll take a fraction of the time I frankensteined this dress. Now I cut my ugly stitches, start again I must. Little does she know I work here, but I'll gladly take her money. I must set aside my hatred for my client. In these walls, I am a seamstress only. Should I use \ machine or keep on stitching with my hands? Let this dress |||=\ mistake you for the corpse they're 'bout to bury. Let the rift get / wider, let the fit awry, and let the stitches look like it was eaten by a horse Let me show / \ this lady how ridiculous she is Who would \\ =|| wear a red dress to a funeral? Sweetie // \ | picked the wrong place.
Chino Villanueva, 12th grade, attends Pembroke Pines Charter High School. He wrote this ekphrastic poem inspired by Jacob Lawrence’s The Seamstress. The trochaic meter mimics the sewing machine’s “striking” and the punctuation conveys the stitches (by hand, by machine, and the lack of).
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