Wednesday 13 August 2008

REFLECTIONS ON KNITTING.


In 2003, Ian McMillian, poet, blew my mind with his poem Hat. Part 1. 

Mr and Mrs Doorbell are knitting on a bench, on a cliff in a storm and they see a fishing boat being wrecked, so they help by knitting a new one....

".....And they almost ran out of wool, and their fingers almost broke,
But there, in the end, was a wool boat, with the mast and the

Cabin and the photographs and even a wool mirror and how
Doorbell knitted that wool mirror I'll never know and in fact Doorbell
Himself said that for years after that day he tried and tried to knit
A wool mirror but he never could. A wool mirror for the wall,   
And Doorbell and Mrs. Doorbell dragged the wool boat to

The edge of the cliff and threw it over and you'd think the wool boat 
Would sink but it didn't, it floated, such was the knitting skill 
Of Doorbell and Mrs Doorbell, and....."

Well I kept thinking how could I knit a mirror and then my friend Sabrina taught me that in America you can have any jpeg knitted up into a blanket. It is a popular service for the families of soldiers going off to war.  They don't ship overseas which is annoying, but Sabrina had it made for me, for our film about knitted smoke and mirrors.

Here is one knitted reflection of putting mascara on.  I love the way my nose looks so big.  How they knitted it, I'll never know.....