Maria Fire - Knit One, Haiku Too

KNIT ONE,

HAIKU TOO

Maria Fire

Adams Media

Avon, Massachusetts

Copyright2006 by Maria Fire.
All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher; exceptions are made for brief excerpts used in published reviews

Published by Adams Media, an F+W Publications Company
57 Littlefield Street
Avon, MA 02322
www.adamsmedia.com

ISBN 10: 1-59337-571-9
ISBN 13: 978-1-59337-571-3

Printed in Canada.

J I H G F E D C B A

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Fire, Maria.
Knit one, haiku too by Maria Fire.
p. cm.
ISBN 1-59337-571-9
1. Knitting. 2. Haiku. 3. Fire, Maria. I. Title.

TT820.F52 2006
746.43'2--dc22
2006014707

This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information with regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering legal, accounting, or other professional advice. If legal advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional person should be sought.

From a Declaration of Principles jointly adopted by a Committee of the
American Bar Association and a Committee of Publishers and Associations

Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their product are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book and Adams Media was aware of a trademark claim, the designations have been printed with initial capital letters.

This book is available at quantity discounts for bulk purchases.
For information, please call 1-800-872-5627.

The Way It is Copyright 1998 by the Estate of William Stafford. Reprinted from The Way It is: New & Selected Poems with the permission of Graywolf Press, Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Contents

Of Suffering and Delight

I discovered the broad magic of knitting when I was eight years old. The year I turned fifty, I was still knitting. That was the year my mother died and I learned to write haiku. I found the way of knitting and the way of haiku have much in common. Both teach focus, patience, and presence in a baffling world of suffering and delight. Both revel in the beauty of the turn whether it's at the end of a row of knitting or at the end of a line of haiku. Both practices help me loop my life together.

The glide of my hands

In my knitting I am free

It is my ocean

A Yarn

Yarn can mean a strand of twisted threads used for knitting. It can also mean a long and entertaining narrative filled with adventures and lore. I hoped to write this book as a poetic and philosophical journey through my knitting life. Once I spun my yarn, I discovered I had knit myself into yet another shape. Whether you are a shape-shifting knitter or not, may the words I have poured through my heart and hands bring you pleasure. May they incline your own heart toward tenderness for yourself and the challenging life you face. I believe in the work we each do, that it serves those who came before, those who are with us now, and those who will come after.

With the words and yarn

How will I dance the right step?

Mystery leads me

All We See

As a child I read that Helen Keller knit. I put on a blindfold and felt my way through my house. For Helen, was all color black? Did the tap of her knitting needles pulse like a butterfly wing close at hand? Perhaps she felt the texture of yarn and smelled its odor more acutely than a sighted person. Today I cast my eyes down to look at my own knitting. What grace to see, in whatever way, creation's beauty.

Ineffable force

My unique experience:

Together we knit

She Bet Right

In 1960, the summer after second grade, Mrs. Warwick moved in next door. We lived in a small town in the heart of North Carolina. When Mother lay down in the afternoon to nap, I slipped out to visit. Mrs. Warwick and I sat in the heat and humidity on her porch swing. My legs dangled from the wooden seat. Hers anchored us and kept us rocking with an even back-and-forth rhythm. Mrs. Warwick fed me lemonade and oatmeal cookies. She taught me to play canasta with the cards lying in our laps. One day, she laid her cards down. I bet you would like to knit, she said. She bet right. Mrs. Warwick knit year round. Even in the summer heat. Otherwise, she said, she would get too grumpy and do harm. She gave me needles, undyed cotton yarn, and taught me the knit stitch. She did my casting on. Then I knit a lumpy square she described as a dishcloth, with the perfect knobby texture for scrubbing counters and plates. That summer, the making of dishcloths consumed me. I gave one to every adult I knew.

Yarn looping in yarn

Tactile and magical, like

Two sticks make a fire

Tough Grits

Mrs. Warwick's husband often complained about minor things. When he did, she muttered under her breath, Tough grits! Grits are corn that has been soaked in lye to become hominy, dried, and then ground. It boils up to a consistency like cream of wheat. As a child my dad ate South Carolina Ice Cream, a treat made with white corn grits, milk, and sugar. I preferred yellow grits, salted and buttered polenta by another name. Those grits were crayon yellow, the color of sunshine, the color I would have preferred knitting my washcloths in. Instead, Mrs. Warwick, quite generously, gave me tough cotton yarn dull beige, like dirty dishwater. Tough grits!

Lacking the color

Find poetry in stitches

Making-do is joy

Along Came a Spider

Spiders, our original knitters, appeared on Earth 310 million years ago. Some spider silks are five times stronger than steel. Sometimes my yarns fray or split apart in my fingers. Yet, when I knit them, a certain shape holds and flexes without tearing. I never understand this miracle of tensile strength.

Visiting Sugar

The week before I started fourth grade I visited my grandfather Sugar Sug for short. When I handed him two of my knitted dishcloths, he held them up and beamed. Then he hung them by his sink. He said he would use one for dishes, the other to wipe down the table and countertop. Sug said knitting was an excellent skill and a soothing habit, or so he'd been told. His mama had knit clothes for him when he was a little boy, and I could learn to do the same. In his widowed retirement my grandfather had moved to live by a muddy lake in the red clay pine-lands of North Carolina. Sug didn't talk a lot, but what he said counted. And he listened to me. He baked pound cakes without recipes and let me drink hot tea with milk served in my grandmother's china cups. When we caught catfish from the lake, he made stew.

Afternoons we spent hiking through the woods around Sug's house. I took short, quick steps to keep up with his long strides. In the evenings we sat on the porch and watched the sun set. At dark I switched on a lamp so I could knit, and I asked my grandfather to recite poetry. He knew long passages of classical poems by heart. Much I didn't understand, but his sonorous voice wrapped the night around usand my busy fingers danced to the music of his words.

Warm words in night air

Pine smell and needles clacking

Oh, sweet obsessions!

Wool Gathering

Poet C. D. Wright calls the unknown place that exists before creation the area of darkest color. Magic always begins with a something that is nothing. One night I dream I am in an open field of grazing sheep. The sky is a blue that pierces the eye. Suddenly puffs of wool are floating down around me. I hold my hands out to catch them and rub snatches of wool between my fingers. I say The possibilities are endless!