Mending Trousers

here's no poetry in mending trousers, none at all.
Now mending socks; that was different.
My grandmother mending socks was poetry.
Getting the soft old cushion just right in the big armchair;
Setting the basket of socks on one side,
sewing basket on the other;
Finding exactly the right shade
in the twisted hank of sock wool…
Grandmother would sit in her armchair,
me at her feet, and she'd recite poetry; old sad poems.
Sometimes, when I'd been good,
it might be a very long poem,
like the Pied Piper,
or when I asked, Maud Muller.
We'd talk poetry, and she'd mend socks.
Today I yearn for loving nights spent mending socks
and talking poetry,
but I throw out socks that develop holes.
I mend trousers, and there isn't any poetry in that.