The Blue Bedazzler

I.

The woman bent over her Bedazzler,

a seamstress of sorts. She was having

a “blue” day. Her family said

“You have a blue Bedazzler.

“You do not sew things as they are.”

She said “Things as they are?”

And they said then “But sew, you must,

“a pattern beyond us, yet ourselves,

“a pattern upon the blue jeans

“of things exactly as they are.”

II.

She did not sew things as they are.

Things are changed by the Bedazzler.

By what thread is her order imposed?

Yellow, red, and white rhinestones,

patterned on the dark blue night of denim

jean jackets, and other rescued clothing

so that all which she possesses she would make shine

with the diamatine sparkling of her desire

spelling out in woven constellations

valentine roses and catholic meditations:

“Each Day a Gift,” just like each stone,

although she works quietly and alone.

III.

But no matter how far she bends,

no matter how long she sews

her pithy cogitations

into the fabric of her clothes,

things as they are do not appear

to change. Things as they are

do not wear embroidered clothes.

Do not at all wear clothes. The cacophony

of the disheveled sphere

which stands naked outside the glow

of the little reading lamp

which lights and lightens her task

does not ask to be redeemed

does not ask to be clothed

in paraphrase or homily

or practiced nods of sympathy

but revels in its anarchy

and loiters, at ease, observing

the narrow futility of her task.