Deborah P Kolodji

Pantsuit in My Closet

The sun rises, brighter than usual. I put on a robin’s egg blue pantsuit to vote with my daughter. I wish my mother were alive.

suffragette photos
my grandmother’s tiny stitches
on the quilt block

Darker after the sun sets, the results trickle in. My son calls and whispers, "I don’t think she’ll win." I count electoral votes in states not yet reporting and tell myself it will be okay.

election returns
at a friend’s house
cans of orange crush

I never post a mother-daughter voting photo to FaceBook. I wake up the next morning and wonder where I am. As the months pass, I hear male voices in the crowd as if for the first time.

hervoiceisannoying   notenoughcharismatobepresident   
whydidn’tshewearbluejeans    whyBillstrayed

math degree
all those men
I worked with