Folding Laundry

There is something about folding laundry.
A quiet, penetrating melancholy about the way my hands move
 that reaches into my core and pulls up the past.
Draws up like water in a bucket the way my mother's hands
 performed this simple task;
 before her, my grandmother's--before that, her grandmother's.
Through ages, this piece of infinite simplicity has persisted.
It has never been a matter of life or death,
 no, it is just a way, a woman's way, of keeping what she loves
 bundled safe, nestled carefully.
Every piece of fabric, cotton light or woolen heavy,
 comes laden with memory.
'Remember then', 'I'll wear this when'..
Today, as I crease, smooth, and stack, I remember:
 the tie-dyed, contented happiness of a drive with my grandmother,
 the clean-cut denim and buttoned cotton of a lecture well-received,
 the green wool that hugged me when I realized I loved my husband,
 the purple wool I wept into when I realized he didn't love me.
Tattered navy that cradled me through my dark days,
 and black lace that tried to prove to me that I was not broken.
The flowing white and grey of finally remembering
 how to dance with wild abandon.
Here in this pile,
 Here is my life. These are my masks and my skins.
Not only do they pull me back, but they push me forward, forward.
Someday, I will do this thing in joy.
Smiling, I will fold the tiny socks and shirts of my first child,
 positively bloomed with love.
Someday, I will do this in sorrow, folding and blessing with salt water
 the effects of those beloved who have gone before I was ready,
 not that I will ever be ready.
Hope and regret, laughter and tears, bright summer and deep winter.
All of them live inside me but today I pour them
 in careful memorized sweeps and folds
 into closets and drawers.

There is just something
 about folding laundry.

-J