Pockets for Two: A Collection of Girlhood – written by Lindsay Ward, illustrated by Brizida Magro
Harper, 2024
If you have ever shopped for women’s and girls’ clothes, you know that pockets are considered highly desirable and disappointingly rare. Men and boys get pockets; women and girls get pocketbooks. Pocketbooks are terrific, but sometimes you need small, attached places to keep stuff. Lindsay Ward and Brizida Magro’s picture book, Pockets for Two, is not a kvetch about lack of pockets, but a celebration of why they are a useful feature and a symbol of friendship. (I reviewed an earlier book illustrated by Magro here; If you would like to read a wonderful grownup book about pockets, I recommend Pockets: An Intimate History of How We Keep Things Close, by Hanna Carlson).
The book begins with pockets as an antidote to fear. Maybe it is the first day of school, or of any new experience. Ward suggests that pockets mean warmth, safety, and security. Magro pictures a girl with a stuffed bunny accompanying her to school. Later, the pocket holds a jump rope in a scene of making friends. Dedicated to girlhood, the picture includes not only the expected jumping rope and hopscotch, but racing Matchbox cars.
Magro’s pictures were created using “rolled printmaking inks, cut paper, pastels, color pencils, acrylic paint,” and digital assemblage. Her design includes artful composition against white space, bright colors, and soft shading. Magro uses the word “tiny” to emphasize the way that pockets contain multitudes on a small scale. Acorns, feathers, pebbles, and sometimes transient items that will fall through a hole, but eventually find a new home. That in itself is a comforting thought for collectors. Two girls playing inside a hollow log have devised their own form of pocket. The illustrations are incredibly inventive, with their collage effect of multi-patterned fabrics, swirling lines, and printed images of Magro’s multimedia approach.
An interesting feature of the book is its seamless connection between collecting, sharing, and the larger importance of friendship. Talking together, the two girls “share our dreams when the world is quiet…imagine what we’ll be.” They may even partner in space exploration, with one driving the rocket, and the other collecting the rocks. Adults participate in supporting the girls’ friendship. A teacher sews the holes that had let treasures escape. Emotions operate on different levels. The compensation for loss is that items disappearing from pockets will still continue to exist. Nevertheless, a needle and thread can prevent this disappointing event from happening too often.
In her author’s note, Ward reminisces about her childhood collecting and lack of appropriate pockets. She confesses that “I’m the woman who will buy a dress simply because it has pockets.” Whether or not you are that woman, you will surely remember the wonder and containment of collecting, storing, collating, appreciating. Pockets for Two contains it all.