To The Spider In the Crevice/Behind The Toilet Door
~ Janet Sutherland

i have left you four flies
three are in the freezer next to the joint of beef
the other is wrapped in christmas paper
tied with a pink ribbon
beside the ironing table in the hall
should you need to contact me
in an emergency
the number’s in the book
by the telephone.

p.s. i love you

I took a basic tapestry weaving class with the delightful Lou Grantham, proprietor of San Francisco Fibre, in August. So of course I know everything about how to weave a tapestry now! (Cue raucous laughter from offstage.)

As with all arts, weaving is best practiced by doing it. I’m certainly not ready to take on something like this:

The Lady and the Unicorn – Sight

So I’m going to start with something a bit less complicated—and smaller! At first I was going to do a bindrune as the perfect choice—it has interesting shapes, but it is all angles, no curves, so it’s easier to weave. (I chose a circle as my first shape to try in the workshop—um, wow. So I’m starting with angles, as the conjunction of straight lines is less complicated to create than the appearance of a curve.)

Here we have ALL THE THINGS needed for the project:

All the Things!

The first step is to string the loom to create the warp. This goes fairly quickly; it’s the tuning and tightening of the strings—somewhat like tuning a harp with just one note—that takes the time. Et, voilà!

The Well-Strung Loom

So then it was time to make the pattern. HahahahaHA. Ha. HA. A bindrune is very easy to draw with pencil or ink. Taking that same set of shapes and enlarging it to fit the loom—not so much. I clearly need more practice at pattern drafting. So, Plan B: something less complicated.

I decided to make a casting cloth (tapestry? rug?) with colored borders corresponding to the four directions. Not as fancy as a bindrune, but something I can do at my current level of experience. I chose colors, and went to sketch the pattern.

Geometry is not my strong suit. Never has been. I have no depth perception, so trying to do geometry is . . . challenging. It took two hours, because having to allow for the edges that are in the weaving but which don’t show once you attach the pattern was a pain. But, I did it! The pattern doesn’t look like much, but it’s going to be helpful—the lines of the graph paper I used match exactly to the warp, which is going to make everything much easier.

Unless one is a weaving genius (which I am not, at least, not yet), one needs to have the design at the back of the loom as a pattern. Some people pin the pattern to the warp, but I’m going to try working with it taped to the back of the loom to see if that’s less complicated. I did it with the pattern pinned to the loom, but I kept knocking it off as I wrestled the shuttles. I’m hoping the tape will be more effective, as well as hoping that my shuttle technique will improve!

Here’s the loom and pattern, set up and ready to go!

Loom with Pattern Taped to It

Weaving is time-consuming, so this is going to be a longer-term project than the clay runes I made at Winter Solstice last year. I’m choosing to do this now during a period where I won’t be traveling, so I can focus some time on it each week. I’ll post regular updates, of course, so do check back!

In the meantime, if you are interested in learning more about weaving, and are fond of historical fiction, I highly recommend Tracy Chevalier‘s book, The Lady and The Unicorn. She’s an excellent writer and the story is fascinating, even if you aren’t a weaver!

Men in the City
~ Alfonsina Storni
Translated from the Spanish by Rachel Benson

The woods of the horizon
are on fire;
eluding flames,
the swift blue bucks
of twilight
cross.

Little golden goats
migrate toward
the vault
and recline
on the blue moss.

Below,
the city
rises up,
a cement rose,
motionless on its stem
of dark cellars.

Its black pistils –
towers, cupolas –
emerge,
waiting for lunar
pollen.

Suffocated
by the flames of the fire
and lost
among the petals of the rose,
almost invisible
crossing back and forth
the men . . .

Sorrows of the Moon
~ Charles  Baudelaire

This evening the moon dreams more lazily;
As some fair woman, lost in cushions deep,
With gentle hand caresses listlessly
The contour of her breasts before she sleeps,

On velvet backs of avalanches soft
She often lies enraptured as she dies,
And gazes on white visions aloft
Which like a blossoming to heaven rise,

When sometimes on this globe, in indolence,
She lets a secret tear drop down, by chance,
A poet, set against oblivion,

Takes in his hand this pale and furtive tear,
This opal drop where rainbow hues appear,
And hides it in his breast far from the sun.

The Birds
~ William Blake

He: Where thou dwellest, in what grove,
Tell me Fair One, tell me Love;
Where thou thy charming nest dost build,
O thou pride of every field!

She: Yonder stands a lonely tree,
There I live and mourn for thee;
Morning drinks my silent tear,
And evening winds my sorrow bear.

He: O thou summer’s harmony,
I have liv’d and mourn’d for thee;
Each day I mourn along the wood,
And night hath heard my sorrows loud.

She: Dost thou truly long for me?
And am I thus sweet to thee?
Sorrow now is at an end,
O my Lover and my Friend!

He: Come, on wings of joy we’ll fly
To where my bower hangs on high;
Come, and make thy calm retreat
Among green leaves and blossoms sweet.

Eurasian Collared-Dove, Credit WolfSongBlog.com