Darkest Day

On the darkest day, if the weather is still, I like to light a candle after dark outside.  Sometimes I put it in the fern bed by the sauna.   Yesterday I put it by the path.   It was a quiet day to weave on linen.

The milk weed pods are still pale green outside, but I found these from last year on my shelf.
Cotton wood, poplar, and maple leaves have been falling into the creek behind the store, and there is a pyramidal rock at the edge that I never saw before today. When I scoop pitchers of water for the flower pots on the porch, I smell mint. The path is a mint path. My weaving can't
begin to compare to the least thing I see on the path outside my back door. But, I did finish a new wool rug. It's a good rug, and feels good on bare feet.

Earth tonic

Spring cress
Rock spring
Spring head


It occurred to me that when I weave a rug I am actually making a path, through the days it takes to weave it, through the ideas I keep and the ones I discard, and finally, a path on the floor, every time I or anyone else walks on it. A path shows where someone else has been, and is an invitation to try it out, to see where it goes.

I was raking grass and weeds, clearing the path up to the spring where the watercress is in season again, beautiful and delicious. I have a crazy appetite for it. In the aftermath of the flood last summer, there are all kinds of branch tangles and obstructions. There are shredded plastic bags, crushed beer cans, styrofoam cups, mud filled milk bottles and pill bottles trapped in the branches and litter. The stream is a warp, and I am untangling a haphazard weave of fence wires and debris.

If I was a little girl this would be play, to make paths through the weeds, fish stuff out of the creek, and sweep the ground under the swamp trees to make houses. When I accidentally stepped into water that filled up my shoe, I knew it was time to go home. Little leopard frogs leap from the creek bank and plop into the algae, and I know there will be schools of tadpoles in these pools, then peepers. Peppery watercress salad for supper tonight, and a feeling to make something good on my loom.