Poetry / Cara L. McKee

'Your Thread'

YOUR THREAD

Written in memory of my friend, Rose, who never dyed her hair purple.

Long and longer still has Clotho spun your thread of life.
Lachesis chose rich colours for your brilliant tapestry,
embroidered with tales, interwoven with others'.
You were well loved. Your life well crafted.

And now Atropos stands with shears in hand.
The fibres diminish in quality.
The distaff grows light.

Clotho spins her thread with careful fingers,
making it fine, finer still,
Lachesis touches it with gentle delicacy,
looping her lace on the layers of your life.

Atropos sets down the shears, takes the delicate thread
of your life left in her fingers, aching like yours.
Fine work she says, pulls the thread taut, testing it.
Her sisters pause in their labours, breath bated.

The thread holds. Atropos smiles.
Her sisters resume their work.
 
They do not feel Atropos’ shears,
not until the tapestry falls.

Your thread lies broken.







Cara L McKee is from Yorkshire but now lives on the west coast of Scotland. Her poetry has been published in places including Gutter Magazine, Brittle Star, Ink, Sweat and Tears, and Sideways. Her chapbook is First Kiss (Maytree Press, 2020), which you can get a signed copy of on Cara’s website: http://skeletonarchitecture.blogspot.com/.