born in 1930, esther rolland had embroidered ladybugs on her khaki pants when i stopped in to see her a few weeks ago where she lives at country meadows in wyomissing, not far from the penn state berks campus. she told me that she joked with a woman there to not worry because they don't bite. the ladybugs. i love when humor sneaks out in this way.
below is an excerpt from her poem from the upcoming second volume in the labors of our fingertips: poems from manufacturing history of berks county.
*
a seamer—that’s what they called people like me at the burkey
underwear company in hamburg. since they made stockings,
too, they had a little shop there. some stockings were black,
fancy, pretty. people would line up at the door to buy them,
once they opened the storefront. two-piece knitted dresses
were for sale as well. but with the stockings, in some cases,
the seams ran up the front of the leg, too, not just in the back,
against the calf and thigh. if you had your work done right,
it was perfect. the boss at that mill, i didn’t like him, the way
he treated people—he had a nasty demeanor about him, and
the workers didn’t deserve that.
void of much in the way of manners, he didn’t impress me.
an older woman, also a seamer, noticed me mid-walk en route
to the bathroom and said, she’s pregnant—she’s pregnant.
i wasn’t. those seamers picked on people. i let them talk.
there’s always somebody who thinks she’s better than you,
in this world. eventually, i did have a baby in me, but i didn’t
tell them my rounding-belly news until my eventual goodbye.
*
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