Culture Woven into Cloth
Janet Kuypers
3/17/24
The old men would collect at the rec hall
Some nights to play pool at the pool table;
Ira would join them on some nights, but
He would bring his own pool cue case,
Adorned with Panamanian art, before he
Would screw together the halves of his
Custom pool cue, and let the games begin.
Call him Ira, of course, but he was also “Doc,”
serving in the U.S. Army as their doctor in
Panama, as troops were stationed there for
Decades. Most who served won’t speak of
Atrocities they may have seen, but with Ira
And his wife Betty all you heard about was
Living around & learning from Panama locals.
Although the sexes were more segregated
There than in the States (keep in mind that
This is the mid-nineteen-hundreds too), but
Fresh fruits and vegetables were so much more
Abundant there, and while appreciating space,
There was still a deep attachment to nature.
Betty would see the women diligently weaving
Thread & cloth into colorful, beautiful mola —
hand-made emblems depicting Mother Nature.
This art was scattered everywhere in their home
(Along with glassed-in box-framed mounts of
The largest insects I’ve ever seen in my life),
But whenever either one of them talked about
Their lives in Panama, they only spoke of the
Real sense of peace and completeness they felt
From the culture there. You did your work, you
Reveled in your space and your surroundings,
In all of the things around you that make you
Feel so complete... We all now worry about
What we can do in our hectic lives to find peace,
And the more time passes the more congested we
Become — but maybe, in Panama, they already
Tapped into the whole Walden/Thoreau culture
Of finding peace through nature. They’ve got
Such beauty all around them, they even weave
This culture into their cloth art — in flowers, fish,
& colorful details of nature. For when you have
this beautiful simplicity, what more do you need.
—
What more do you need, other than to count on
Mother Nature to keep everything so serene (if you
can’t count on humankind not imposing their will,
like building the Panama Canal in the first place).
That’s when nature strikes back, dropping rainfall
in half for over a year, bringing prolonged drought
that forces Panama to greatly reduce ships through
this global canal because of such low water levels.
The people of Panama literally need water, but
the world needs whatever they want to ship across
that Panama Canal faster, so Panama, after a year,
started lifting some shipping restrictions — but at a
harrowing cost to marine life and their own access
to drinking water. So, serene or not, whatever actions
people take to try to correct how they’ve changed
what nature made, and sudden climate change messes
with humanity’s plans, we all forget the unintended
consequences of our actions — even in our actions
of trying to correct our problems. This caused issues
with the economy, but also environmental issues to
Panama — so let’s work on what truly needs saving.
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