SUNDAY POEMS

An adage reimagined for the new age in which we're living

SUTURES

A stitch in time,
they say, but you know better: 
no stitch would be required if not for a tear 
in the fabric, if not for a hole in need of darning, 
if not for a gap in the whole-cloth narrative.
Best get stitching. The clock is ticking.

What about the nine saved in the process?
Is never being needed the same as being
saved? Why worry about salvation in the midst  
of so many rags and bones? Who cares about 
conserving labor when the whole damn edifice 
has come undone? How do we stop the unspooling 
before the thread is irretrievably lost?

A stitch in time
is fine if fine is what you’re after,
but no stitch can mend so seamlessly 
what’s been rent that it seems it never happened. 
It happened. Look closely and you’ll see 
the cross-stitched scars that prove it. 

©2026 Skip Berry