Loom Song

The warp is set before you speak — threads pulled taut as violin strings, each one a different shade of waiting. Your foot finds the treadle's worn groove and the shed opens like a held breath, the shuttle passing through with its trailing whisper of blue. Count: one, two, one, two. The body learns what the mind forgets — that every fabric begins as an argument between tension and give. Row by row the pattern climbs, a language older than the loom itself, each crossing a small commitment, each line a sentence you cannot unsay. When you cut the cloth free at last it holds the warmth of your hours, the imperfections only you can read — where your attention wandered, where you pulled the thread back home.