A Crazy Quilt

Grandmother passed away January 16th, 2011, and she left behind many quilts that she had quilted.  Some had even been quilted along with her mother.  In her scrapbooks, I found this poem and wanted to share.  The picture is of the 3 quilts that Grandmother gave to Billie, Kyleigh, and me before she died.

A Crazy Quilt

They do not make them anymore,

For quilts are cheaper at the store

Than woman's labor, though a wife

Men think the cheapest thing in life.

But now and then a quilt is spread

Upon a quaint old walnut bed,

A crazy quilt of those old days

That I am old enough to praise.

Some women sewed these points and squares

Into a pattern like life's cares,

Here is a velvet that was strong,

The poplin that she wore so long,

A fragment from her daughter's dress,

Like her, a vanished loveliness;

Old patches of such things as these,

Old garments and old memories.

And what is life?  A crazy quilt;

Sorrow and joy, and grace and guilt,

With here and there a square of blue

For some old happiness we knew;

And so the hand of time will take

The fragments of our lives and make,

Out of life's remnants, as they fall,

A thing of beauty, after all.

By Douglas Malloch