Mikaela Castledine #101 The Shirts of Edgar Aged 26

The shirts of Edgar aged 26

(The hands of Violet Elsie aged 40 if the truth were known)

Perhaps it starts with the shirts

the three shirts all so badly made by his mother and sisters

big enough for two large men to walk abreast

long enough for a night shirt

such a trial for a young man already so ill fitting in his own skin

Violet Elsie can hardly bear to look at him

all tufts of hair and skin emerging

from volumes of the stiffest white shirting

Violet Elsie is a seamstress of very high regard

she can turn a man’s shirt in an afternoon and so she does

chopping them into almost twice the number all beautifully resewn

such a puzzle it must be

for his family to see him dressed in such quality 

and the quantity bewildering

for neither Edgar nor Violet Elsie ever told them

where the extra shirts had came from

And so Edgar is in her debt

which is where she likes to keep people

and with such an intimate favour

the shirts her hands have made daily touching his very skin

her strange relationship with Edgar begins

This is a small piece of family folklore, taken from a short story called 'Ruff and Honours', which I am planning to use as inspiration for a work of art. Working it into a poem seemed the best way to transmit it from one medium to another.