The Century Quilt

The Century Quilt serves to connect the speaker’s life to her diverse background. First of all, the quilt brings her back to her youthful days. The speaker describes her dreams of “wrapping [herself] at play with [the blanket’s] folds and [play] chieftains and princesses.” This quilt connects her to her past and thus to her family. She reminisces about her first blanket, which serves as a doorway to her past experiences and emotions. She wants a blanket to “have good dreams for a hundred years.” The speaker makes a connection with Meema, who “dreams of her yellow sisters” and “about Mama.” She recalls her father coming home from his store and the family cranking up the pianola. The speaker expresses an appreciation of these experiences and a fondness of her family members.

The tone is gentle and reminiscent. She refers to the blanket as one she’d like to “die under.” Although this line may seem morbid, the composed flow of relaxed and peaceful segments of the poem indicates that the line represents a calm acceptance of fate, because as long as she has her quilt, she is surrounded with the warm memories of her family and her youth. The blanket serves as a window not only to the past but also into the future. The speaker describes it as inducing a dream of meeting his future son and relates this experience to the experience he has had with his parents: “his father’s burnt umber pride” and his “mother’s ochre gentleness.”