Bead embroidery ~ March bead journal project finished

This one was difficult.

I started working on it in March, became cloaked by the darkness of it, and then abandoned it to work on the sweet, gentle new beginnings of April (here). Finally, March called me back... I finished it today.

My initial intent was to make a portrait of my husband. As my beading evolved, it morphed into a look at the part of him that is best described by the title of my piece: His Parents Were Alcoholics.


Today, as I photographed the finished work, a poem began to form in my head. Here it is.

His Parents Were Alcoholics

Always I’m aware of Wall,
built higher during hard times,
separating his dark, prickly fears
and deep, festering wounds
from his lighter, easy-going side.

Holes in Wall,
where pressure builds
and he can’t get them plugged,
let the grace of light in
and the sharp sting of dark out.

Only Beaver, his totem animal,
goes freely back and forth
from one side to the other.
Beaver is keeper of Wall
and fulcrum of delicate balance.

When first I fell in love with him,
a friend said “He’s damaged goods.
Run, run in the opposite direction
and don’t look back.”
She saw the dark.

I see the joyful light
and love every swirl of it.
I see the darkness too
and am trying to understand it,
to caress it tenderly.

He and Beaver are still at work,
mending childhood wounds
inflicted by parents,
altered by alcohol and
oblivious to a boy’s needs.

Robin A.
5-20-08