Learning to Bead by Elena Bentley

November 25, 2022
Poem name: Learning to Bead Poet name: Elena Bentley Poem: My anxious fingers fumble with the beads. In the midst of a pandemic, alone at home, I grieve for a life not lived. A life without Michif on my tongue, fiddle music in my soles, fresh baked bannock at the table. I learn to bead from YouTube videos. Watch a stranger’s hands lift the needle, chasing glass seeds around a bowl. I listen to her voice, try to weave beads into delicate petals. Pink and yellow bursts against black felt. I teach myself because my mother and grandmother don’t know how to sew. Because my great-grandmother knew one pattern: drink, beat, repeat. With every sip, she swallowed another bead inside her. Buried them until the bottles emptied. Her stomach full of amber-coloured memories, tied shut in double knots. She refused to rip open the past, spill shame over another generation. I wish I could mend the holes she left in us. I reach deep, hide every bead inside myself, follow our roots back before the battles, flow through to the Red River. To a forgotten place where little girls sit, nestled in rounds like rows of beads, watching their mothers’ and grandmothers’ hands. They listen, learn to be Métis because there is nothing yet to grieve. Pride passes from palm to palm, daughter to daughter, their confident fingers teach me how to change the pattern. I sew my ancestors’ lessons to my mind. Loop beads to my flesh. Stitch tradition, tether it in time: thread, bead, repeat. End of poem. Credits and bio: Copyright © Elena Bentley Previously published in The Malahat Review, Summer 2021 (vol. 215, pg. 42). Elena Bentley (she/her) is a disabled, bi, and Métis/settler poet, editor, book reviewer, and children’s book author (The Pickle in Grandma’s Fridge, YNWP, 2022) from Treaty 6 territory. She is a Citizen of Métis Nation-Saskatchewan, and she holds an MA in English from the University of Toronto. Her poetry has been published in various magazines and journals, including Arc Poetry, The Malahat Review, PRISM international, Room, and Grain. Most recently, Elena was a finalist for Vallum Magazine’s 2022 Vallum Chapbook Award, and she received an Honourable Mention in Grain Magazine’s 2022 Short Grain Contest (poetry category). She is the poetry editor for untethered magazine. Find out more at www.elenabentley.com, or follow Elena on Twitter and Instagram @_elenabentley_