Sunday, August 03, 2014

Socks and Love - an introductory lecture on Ravelry.com

Oh, you can find almost anything on Ravelry.com. Yarns and patterns. Yarn stores and sellers. Korean drama lovers, German Shepherd owners, Formula One fans and sock appreciation societies. 
And poetry . . .





“Ode to My Socks” by Pablo Neruda
(translated by Robert Bly) 

Mara Mori brought me 
a pair of socks 
which she knitted herself 
with her sheepherder’s hands, 
two socks as soft as rabbits. 
I slipped my feet into them 
as if they were two cases 
knitted with threads of twilight and goatskin, 
Violent socks, 
my feet were two fish made of wool, 
two long sharks 
sea blue, shot through 
by one golden thread, 
two immense blackbirds, 
two cannons, 
my feet were honored in this way 
by these heavenly socks. 
They were so handsome for the first time 
my feet seemed to me unacceptable 
like two decrepit firemen, 
firemen unworthy of that woven fire, 
of those glowing socks.
Nevertheless, I resisted the sharp temptation 
to save them somewhere as schoolboys 
keep fireflies, 
as learned men collect 
sacred texts, 
I resisted the mad impulse to put them 
in a golden cage and each day give them 
birdseed and pieces of pink melon. 
Like explorers in the jungle 
who hand over the very rare green deer 
to the spit and eat it with remorse, 
I stretched out my feet and pulled on 
the magnificent socks and then my shoes.
The moral of my ode is this: 
beauty is twice beauty 
and what is good is doubly good 
when it is a matter of two socks 
made of wool in winter.