Making the most of it

She smooths the fabric
Needle
swimming through the cloth
designs
growing from her fingers
the metal snake
swift and quick
pokes her finger
she doesn't
flinch
the blood swells
from an unseen hole
inflating
red from white
crying down her skin
she doesn't move
she doesn't flinch
the red cat
hanging
by its claws
from her nail
tumbling towards
the
white 
white
white
dying the cloth
red
red
red
the cat
drawing a pond
with its paw
jagged edges
yanking themselves
farther in the forest
full of 
threads
all the while
she doesn't move
she doesn't flinch
she pokes a black thread
through the metal snake
it doesn't mind
charting the snake
around the pond
she edges it in night
black
hugging the red
forming petals
she tightens the 
last stitch
looking at her work
where the blood had colored,
was now a flower
bright against the white
her head dips
an almost invisible
gesture that she was
pleased
anyone who had not been in the room
would not have known
the flower was blood
and the stitching wasn't planned
she cleared her throat
wiped her hair off her shoulders and 
she smoothed the fabric