Yarn Journal Entries

9 creative works found

• Horses and Steam
  by LeonD

  This piece of prose was written as a small tribute to the previous generations for their effort and contributions to the conditions we en…

  This piece of prose was written as a small tribute to the previous generations for their effort and contributions to the conditions we enjoy today. Horses and Steam They can be seen on almost any day / In any country town / Old men who gather in small groups / Of three or maybe four. / They sit on the Post Office seat / Or the one at the local General Store. / Some sit on the small veranda of the Local / Stuffing and puffing their briar, and they / Yarn and reminisce / On the days of horses and steam. Most have experienced war, some two. / But because of the relentless march / Of time, they are now few. / They eye strangers with suspicion. / “Who’s he” says one as a young fellow passes. / “Dunno” says another “never seen ‘im” / “Not a local, been here sixty years meself, still not a local” / And so it goes, but they soon drift back and / Yarn and reminisce / On the days of horses and steam. So as the days pass, and / These men become few / They will remain in memories / Of all those they knew. / When you blokes have thrown off / Your mortal coils / Rest peacefully old warriors / But get together on occasions and please, / Yarn and reminisce / On the days of horses and steam.

• Solstice Blessings To One & All
  by EarthHart

  MERRY SOLSTICE It’s a couple of days or so before Christmas, you’ve got everyt…

  MERRY SOLSTICE It’s a couple of days or so before Christmas, you’ve got everything sourced & sorted. From that which you give to that which you consume, like the gifts, the turkey, the nut-roast, the ham, boxes of fruit & veg along with plenty of booze. And it’s all thanks to your little piece of plastic. You’re having a well earned rest and a very well earned drink, sitting before a roaring log fire watching the flames climb up the chimney. You are drawn inward by the warmth of the fire when suddenly a face appears in the flames, an old man, his face painted, his long white beard plaited. Smiling, he holds out his hand, beckoning to you. Stretch out your hand. Stretch out Your Hand. / Do you not have a greeting for me? Today of all days. Ending and Beginning Day. The day of Death and New Birth. Try “Merry Solstice” or “Solstice Greetings”. You have forgotten me. Haven’t you. Your children tell sweet tales of me and you laugh behind their backs. But I tell you; your children are wiser than you. You still don’t remember me do you? Think back; think back to the very beginnings. Back to a time when the Long Darkness brought hunger to your fireside. A black stranger to live with you. The dull pain of famine. Think back to the times of the pounding heart, the ache of the chase, the madness of the kill. The smell of blood hot on the snow. The Red and the White. Red and White. When the dulling eye and ebb of breath meant an easing of hunger. For a while. Do you remember me Now? Your children draw pictures of me, an old man in a red suit with a white beard, squeezing down the chimney with all they want most in the world. / Lord of the Reindeer, Guardian of the Forest, Keeper of the Game. As old as mankind. I am the Shaman, the magician, the priest. / When your heart beats fast in the dead of night, I am there. When you whistle or sing in the face of fear and danger, it is I who call the tune. I am your ancestor and your child. I am your guest tonight, and you will be mine. Here is my invitation to your house, a green tree from the northern forests. See, somethings you still remember, an evergreen tree, hung with lights and mirrors, sparkling gold like the glimmer of Solstice fire through the forest branches. Red and White. Blood on the snow. And tonight, the night of ending and beginnings, of death and rebirth. The Birth of the Sun. The Solstice. Come; come with me, back to the very beginnings. Stretch out your hand to me. Stretch out over a thousand generations. Come, and understand once more. (The Holly and the Ivy) 1st verse and chorus. Ah yes, the running of the deer, the rising of the Sun. A song in praise of the woods and forests, the beasts and the seasons. / And then one day the Christ people came. Turning their backs on what IS, and demanding what should be, as if they were lords of it all. They even took that song and made it theirs, just as they took my Solstice festival for their own. The Sun, the birth of the sun, as it always was, for as long as mankind has gaped at the sky and questioned the light and the darkness. Birth of a….Son, birth of a boy child. Their festival is just a trick of words, a fashion of the last few seconds of the history of man. But while the Christ people tried to drive me back into the shadows before their new born godling, they still feared me. For the Shaman was their ancestor too. The blood on the snow. / So they tried to tame me, contain me, cage me. Turn me into a tale for little children, a bringer of gifts, a driver of reindeer, an old man from the north, with a white beard and a little magic. / But their children were wiser than they. In their turn, they remember the Solstice fire. Hark, in the distance a Cathedral Choir is singing a Latin choral. O day spring, brightness of light everlasting and sun of righteousness. Come and enlighten him that siteth in darkness and the shadow of death. Lighten the world and cast out the darkness of the spirit. / Do you remember Now? Are the memories stirring? Pass; pass as the Shaman passes, as a thought in a dream. Pass with me to the edge of the pitching forests, the edge of the wind-scoured plain, back to the very beginning, when hungry ice drew back, the bare earth swelled and the Hunter strode over it to the north. / Smell the chill on the wind; black winter is here too. The red and white mushroom is ahead, agaric, the Shaman’s bridge, the crossing to the spirit world. / Come. Eat. Soon you will see the Shaman’s reindeer fly again, skimming the snow, speckled deer riding the northern winds, pulling a sleigh with an old man in a red coat bringing gifts. I tell you, your children are wiser than you. The dark forest presses in on each side, the ice casts an iron band around your chest, snatching breath, but there, ahead, is Fire, Solstice Fire. The crackling flames leap high into the darkness, the visible into the invisible. A wise woman turns to you and says, “Red cat on the hearth, stripped with gold, spitting and twisting, could eat the whole house if you let her.” Now do you see how you are favoured? Midwinter blesses you with a festival of commercial extravagance and consumption, of over eating, drinking and all that that entails. But look, beyond the fire there, to the shadows, do you see the old people, near ghosts, waiting for the call to take them. This is the real midwinter, a time of hunger, when the old set themselves to die, to lighten the load on the rest. A hunter comes to the fire and cutting off a piece of venison, remarks, “In the summer, fattening time, the reindeer moved in herds on the plain and we hunters followed, killing for our people, food in our bellies. That was a fine time, sun hot grasslands and the grouse so plump and slow, they could hardly rise away from our arrows. But winter’s never far away. It soon blew down from the mountaintops, bringing the night spirits to live with us. If you listen, you’ll hear the long dead howling in the forest.” The old woman turns to the young ones gathered. “Here is a wee riddle for you. One-legged seamstress has needles but can’t sow. Wears the same green gown each day and a white overcoat in winter.” Ah, kindle the fire, heat to heat, light to light. Give back fire to the Sun at midwinter. Bring New Fire to each home, a burning log from the forest. Fire, to ease the birth pangs of the Sun. The stones of the Earth remember a time when the Sun did not return to them from the darkness. Then, ravenous ice engulfed the land, bringing nothing but stark, white silence. The very mountains were split and worn to sand. What chance had the hunters and their people? For this reason, they made a gift of flame to the Sun in midwinter, so that it would return to them. Red Flame and White Ash. Red and White. Solstice Fire. The wise woman looks out into the darkness, “Whither, whither black flowering night, may your dark juices bleed, burn up like a pool on the summer plain, shrivel like a stain upon the sand, dwindle to a basalt pebble, tiny as a slow worm’s eye. Vanish to nothing.” A Red Deer comes over the hill. Shoot your arrows as you will. The Deer will stand there still. The hunter stands and faces the east, looking beyond the fire; “The Sun will rise, as a Deer on the hill. Let the Shaman draw on rock with white chalk and red ochre, and let the likeness live. The Reindeer, the Raven, the Bear, the leaping Salmon and the Wolf, let all those we have killed bring their gifts. Brother Reindeer, I’m in your debt. You give me your brown autumn hide to wrap me, my buckskin shoes, my summer tent and sleeping bag, my skin boat, which slips across the lake. Your sinews are my thread, your bones are my needles. My family eat your tongue, bone marrow, flesh and your unborn fawns. From the birth of this New Sun to its death next winter you give me all these again. Follow the paths I know, from fawn-birth to rutt, across the river where an arrow with my mark on it can bring you down in the red water. My gift to you in return, is never to kill you without need, and then only to take flesh, bone and hide, to leave your spirit free on the plain. Come to the Fire.” And the Shaman’s magic will make it so. That is his task, to climb down through the smoke-hole of the hut, with fire and a wooden reindeer painted in red ochre, and so make toys of its wild brothers. “Pruk pruk.” And you, black soul of Ravens, you who share our killing, you are our kin, you eat our meat and watch over our camps. Bran, the trickster, your feathers hung from our flag-sticks driving the deer into our traps, deceiving them, making them afraid of feathers, when arrows lie ahead. But, Brother Raven, do not deceive us like that. You know the Sun must be born again tonight, without its light you will not find food. Without its warmth your feathers will not dry and your young will die of cold. The hunter calls to the forest, “Brother Bear, welcome. Shadow of death in the forest. Your claws split open the hunter from head to belly. And yet, your flesh dries on a stick in the summer heat outside the hut of the fortunate hunter. The hunter looks over to the river, “And you, Salmon of wisdom, you are caught in my traps. Your flesh clears my mind so I can see clearly when I hunt, may you swim forever up the river.” All this, the Shaman will promise. As priest, keeper of the game, magician and midwife to the Sun. (Wolf Howl) / Caught in the firelight a pair of eyes sparkle at the edge of the forest. The Wolf stands his ground. / “Don’t forget me. We are one, you and I. Hunter and hunted. My gifts to you are the leap swifter then thought, and the strength to run all day without slackening till the heart is run out of your prey. I wish you the comfort and honour of the pack about you and the wisdom that knows caution but not fear.” The hunter replies, “Come to the fire, brother, but not too near.” Brothers of the natural world and you others, silent watchers from the shadow world, long dead and unborn. It is the Night of longest darkness, time of greatest danger. The Solstice Fire burns as a sign to the Sun that it must return or we shall be left in the ice of eternal blackness. None here, O Sun has forgotten our debt to your warmth and light. There is a disturbance in the air this night. Some one here has failed the trust. There is a Law-breaker here who has forgotten the custom. I hear the sound of cash tills ringing and sales staff selling their wares. “This is a trick!” Snaps the Wolf, “These things cannot be. This is the world upside-down, like the image in the lake on a still day.” (Raven) You are wrong Wolf. I have seen it. Looking around, the hunter asked to the night, “Who speaks?” “It is I. Bran the Raven.” “How can you possibly know?” “Hunter, your feet are on the ground. Your nose is pressed to the blood trail. I fly high above your head, high enough to see what’s to come. And I tell you; the world will be turned on its head.” The Wolf growled, “Raven, you’re a liar just as always. How could anyone who lives under the Sun forget the Solstice, and the Earth’s Old Laws?” Are you going to tell them? How to live with the Earth and not from it. (Raven) “I tell you, where they have passed, the grass is scorched away and the trees die as if withered by a brush fire, except no green shoots follow. They destroy faster than they can grow. The cycles of seed and harvest are no longer something to live by, but something to be altered. The animals are no longer brothers but slaves.” “How could they have forgotten?” Pondered the hunter. (Raven) “Knowledge hath made them stupid. Seeing too much has made them blind. One thing they are sure of, that anything simple is a tale for little children.” “So, so the children are the Keepers of the Truth.” Replied the hunter smiling at the young ones around the blazing fire. The shaman looks directly at you with his palms open. / “And your children are wiser than you. Perhaps they can tell you why every year you set up an evergreen tree from the forest like those about you now. Do you think it is to please them that you hang shining Sun symbols on it? Or is it because in the beginnings of time, your forefathers hung dead sacrifices on the living limbs of the trees, as gifts to the reborn Sun. Still you utter the words “Yule Log” without remembering the burning branch from the forest, with which I brought the Solstice Fire to the hearth, climbing down through the smoke-hole to bring light and warmth. And wooden fetishes of deer, bear, duck, salmon and other animals for the children, so that hunting will be good through the next turning of the Sun.” “Remember if you forget the very roots of belief, if you forget the Earth, her Laws and Seasons, you are lost.” To you all I give Solstice Blessings and may the reborn Sun, light & guide your way forward through the coming seasons and fill your hearts and spirits with love and joy. May you never know hunger, of the body and of the heart & soul. And may the Light of the World bring Peace to all Life on our troubled planet. Merry Solstice.

• Featured (Yarn Art)
  by Virginia N. Fred

  Wow “Yarn Art” has been featured in the group called “All Around the Styles, thanks to the host of the group cougarfan MaryK Max Michels…

  Wow “Yarn Art” has been featured in the group called “All Around the Styles, thanks to the host of the group cougarfan MaryK Max Michelsen for the honor, woo hoo I realy like how this one turned out not my usual style but tried something new for a change thanks again….gina

• Tell me a story.....
  by Karin Taylor

  This is something i’m doing in response to this I love stori…

  This is something i’m doing in response to this I love stories don’t you? Do you have a short story? Do you know of someone else that’s written a fabulous short story here on RB? Link me up! Just a short story, a yarn, something amazing that’s happened to you, something encouraging…...I don’t think I ever really grew up, or do grown ups like stories too…. if you have a story, and an image you can add to the story….i’d really like to hear it….I’m hoping for stories about compassion, or something that triggered a new way of life, even if something negative happened that turned into a positive….... yarns your elders told you that have been passed down, which are of some signifcance to you…...please, share them with the rest of us…....write them in your writing area, and send me a link….or if you feel they are more of a journal entry rather than a formal written piece….then do it in your journal and link it back to me here….i wanna here your stories….. if you have already written a story, just link me :) thank you…i’m looking forward to this ;) oh….ps…..please be sure to read as many of these stories as you can also, you can leave comments and encourage the writer….....and also leave your comments and reviews here, they are welcome :)

• June's Good ... I Like June - 3 June and 3 More Features :-)
  by taiche

  Many many thanks to the following groups and the hosts that have chosen to share my wares! (and Hertsman). Spinning A Yarn” was featur…

  Many many thanks to the following groups and the hosts that have chosen to share my wares! (and Hertsman). Spinning A Yarn” was featured in Rural Around The Globe “I’m All Ears” was featured in Art and Stories Made Fo… “It’s spam” was featured in Twisted Sisters (lesbia…

• Spinning A Yarn" was featured in Acrylic Painting
  by taiche

  Features A mega huge thanks to the hosts of the following: !http://images-0.redbubble.net/img/users/size:135×135/view:avatar/hert…

  Features A mega huge thanks to the hosts of the following: (not forgetting Hertsman). ..The magic goes on …..... Spinning A Yarn” was featured in Acrylic Painting JULY FEATURES /

• You Gotta join this !!!!
  by SNAPPYDAVE

  Hi All I would like you to be aware of our new group ‘Yer pullin’ my leg’ ... its now up and running from today 14.8.09 …. please co…

  Hi All I would like you to be aware of our new group ‘Yer pullin’ my leg’ ... its now up and running from today 14.8.09 …. please come along and join in the creative fun …. especialy if your on our watchlist’s already, then you have no excuses !!! PLEASE read the rules (they are straight forward) and easy to follow leaving it open to every RB member to join without exception provided your work meets the ‘open ended’ criteria ! Thanks … I look forward to seeing your face on our members list and having a good old laugh at your works (in the best possible sense of ‘Laughing’) !!! Thanks Dave & Kelly (SNAPPYDAVE & tuffcookie)

• Bucket List... sort of
  by SiriusPutsch

  Learn to identify birds by song Spin yarn from the cat and dog hair I’ve saved Learn to identify edible & medicinal wild plants ...

  Learn to identify birds by song Spin yarn from the cat and dog hair I’ve saved Learn to identify edible & medicinal wild plants Learn how to handle horses Learn to sail Learn the Chinese calligraphy for the essential characters in the vernacular of Feng Shui, Chinese Medicine, Taoism, and Confucianism Learn to tune a piano Live in a foreign (language) country for at least a year Go back-packing for 7-10 days Swim with dolphins Cavort with apes

• Yarn Magazine
  by Karin Taylor

  / *Stunning Wearable Art – Hand Woven Scarf Wr…

  / Stunning Wearable Art – Hand Woven Scarf Wrap – a gorgeous explosion of fibre and colour by Christine Jones / available here / / Description / This beautiful scarf is hand woven in a freeform style by my friend Chris Jones. The warp is a Japanese yarn composed of wool, silk, kid mohair & nylon. The weft is a creative mix of wool roving, handspun and commercial yarns and silk ribbon recycled from Indian saris . The result is a stunning wearable art scarf/wrap that has been handcrafted. It is soft to wear against the skin but has some body to its drape, allowing for individual styling. / Size: / approx length including fringe: 76 1/2” (194cm) / width: 6 1/2” (17cm) / Care: gentle handwash, lay flat to dry / $60 USD My good friend and fellow bubbler Chris Jones has just had her work Flamenco appear on the front of new Yarn Magazine modelled by a gorgeous model, WOW, Congratulations Chris!!!!! Chris’s knitwear looks absolutely stunning, boho, chic, tribal, ethnic…not only did she hit the front page, she also contributed to the magazine with a write up on one of her recent adventures and a pattern for others to knit… Congratulations again Chris!!!! This is a huge deal! You can see the blue/green version on the cover here on the website: http://www.yarnmagazine.com.au/ then if you scroll down, on the right hand side are all the designs in this issues. Pics of Chris’s are under the girl in the big orange hat. They’ve done a collage of the 2 colourways which you can click on to enlarge. Please check it out and if you get a chance, make sure you congratulate Chris and/or check out her portfolio and her yarnaboutyarn website and her etsy shop where she sells her gorgeous stuff… and check out this fab scarf for sale which she made and sells via etsy (a place for homemade goodies)