My Red Thread 

Her first girl job, my grandma said,  

was weaving bedsheets with red thread. 

In spider mills, street talk lip-read, 

she span town bonds: bed-wed/kindred. 

Her daughter tugged (fiery redhead) 

a route through school, her tautness led 

from sweeping floors till felt frays bled 

to marking English papers sore. 

A-scenting steps like gingerbread 

in hand-me-downs, some word, some wore, 

I ravelled myself, lost our thread, 

strung out on some writer’s floor.   

We’d lived love verses cloaked in lead, 

crossing paper till it tore 

a maze, engraved, an oh-pen door. 

If labyrinth, then minotaur. 

I spooled his monster, blood galore, 

a menstruating red-pen whore/ 

holy Mary/one-celled spore, 

his reject stories in my store: 

wastepaper womb-cum-writer’s drawer.  

In dark and dank, my artist bore 

ink, first lines, foetal, mat-black gore 

(still, inside, full-stopped, yarn-rolled red). 

I snagged my point, heart-red at core.  

Reeling history back ahead, 

I mined our cave to find love’s ore: 

extracted mettle, needled thread. 

A woman’s life is an encore, 

stitching time till we sew red. 

She trailed all ways with express tread. 

She pulled myself from A to Z. 

All our lives that go unread 

are tangled up in this red thread: 

our private power-pain-bloodshed. 

Weave her forever ever-red 

weave her forever ever-red 

weave her forever ever-red 

weave her forever ever-red 

a woman’s life is an encore 

weave her forever ever-red: 

Published in Worktown Words November 2024: https://livefromworktown.org.uk/2024/11/10/worktown-words-patterns-november-2024/