I spent countless Saturdays in the back room of “Viau’s”, our little clothing store. My imagination ran amuck under the influence of comic books and chocolate cake donuts from the bakery next door.
The wicker basket lived
beneath
the orange counter with the ironing board
near the sewing machines
of our clothing store.
It ate the scraps of shrinking men.
What remained:
cotton,
wool,
silk,
and leather.
A putrid puzzle if assembled
with ill intent.
A macabre monster,
raised from the remnants
of the wearers.
A patchwork predator—
this wicker wraith;
this bane of boredom.
Its only weakness,
the blades of my father,
hung from a hook
near the thread cabinet.
Kept razor sharp for splitting seams
forbidden to all but one—
and he,
the non-believer.
But I knew better.
I bore witness
that dreary
Saturday morning.
If only he’d taught me
his trade:
to cut,
to sew,
to tailor,
the scraps.
