Four Needle Technique

Sewing recovers memory. Once,

my mother hurled a thread across the room 

but instead of tangling, it crossed a threshold and fled 

from the house and like a cat I chased it. 

In the wake of my sprint, I sensed my halting stomach

and a nation halving so I used her sewing kit to

kiss a needle by burning the tip to tie my thumb

with a string and constrict bloodflow to prick 

the little sliver of flesh  on the corner of the thumb and press 

to let the blood out to relieve

an oxymoron for the 38th parallel, to relieve

a meal that seems to last forever, to relieve

this thread I hid away in a shoebox that furled under my skin.

For years, it sliced through my wrists and for years,

it raveled and unraveled.