Grandmother’s Gallery Poem by Daleen Enslinstrydom

You will always find her on the porch
with her grey head bended,
her glasses shifted just right
and with her embroidery on her lap.

With love she did embroid every stitch
and figured out every pattern
that she could find
and all her work was fit
for a royal palace.

Candlewick and cross-stitch
and ribbon embroidery
was done by her,
intricately she did wove
stitches into beautiful pieces of art
of her own gallery

and she did use pure cotton and silk
made lacy borders and frills
and her art works were
almost far too beautiful to behold
and on every couch and bed
in the house there was
scattered cushions
but no one dared to touch them.

Lilies and roses, girls with umbrellas
and boys on bicycles, Victorian ladies,
birds of all kinds was stitched in needlepoint
and in grandmother’s gallery for her descendants
all of her work was masterpieces

but her hands are resting now.