Mauve, Green and Champagne Sequins
Published in Whitefish Review vol. 4 issue 2, Whitefish MT
My mother made her wedding dress, not knowing
she’d be married in it, from a McCall’s pattern in 1944--
mauve silk, and 127 random sequins decorated the front.
Below the left breast, yellow beads form stems for
sequined roses in champagne, pink and purple,
and for green sequined leaves.
Side zipper’s camouflaged by a gathered flounce
of the same silk, dress belted with a hand stitched cinch.
What was she thinking that February day when she
tightened her belt and walked out
of her parents’ home after thirty-five years
to run off to the next state to marry my father,
the unapproved groom, never to speak
to her own mother again, or visit her bedside
in the hospital the next year or go to the funeral and grave
or put down her burden of anger and hatred
which she packed and unpacked in emotional totes
for the next sixty five years of her life?
What was she thinking? I have the dress,
which I wore to a forties party in college,
letting out the inner sleeve seams a bit and explaining
to befuddled gazers that my mom was married in it.
She picked that dress that day to wear
to marry the man she’d known for twenty years,
but who was the wrong religion.
No conversion, just compromise. But not with her mother
ever, never, hating, loathing, cursing the one
she’d lived with for thirty-five years.
I have the dress. I’ll give it to my daughter someday
to have something to think about.
she’d be married in it, from a McCall’s pattern in 1944--
mauve silk, and 127 random sequins decorated the front.
Below the left breast, yellow beads form stems for
sequined roses in champagne, pink and purple,
and for green sequined leaves.
Side zipper’s camouflaged by a gathered flounce
of the same silk, dress belted with a hand stitched cinch.
What was she thinking that February day when she
tightened her belt and walked out
of her parents’ home after thirty-five years
to run off to the next state to marry my father,
the unapproved groom, never to speak
to her own mother again, or visit her bedside
in the hospital the next year or go to the funeral and grave
or put down her burden of anger and hatred
which she packed and unpacked in emotional totes
for the next sixty five years of her life?
What was she thinking? I have the dress,
which I wore to a forties party in college,
letting out the inner sleeve seams a bit and explaining
to befuddled gazers that my mom was married in it.
She picked that dress that day to wear
to marry the man she’d known for twenty years,
but who was the wrong religion.
No conversion, just compromise. But not with her mother
ever, never, hating, loathing, cursing the one
she’d lived with for thirty-five years.
I have the dress. I’ll give it to my daughter someday
to have something to think about.
