The Knitting Circle (story below)
When the craft slid down through the morning haze, it made no more sound than a sigh. The pilot, small, round, with luminous eyes like water-drops catching light, settled it carefully between the hedge and a birdbath, in a garden fragrant with lavender and moss.
A line of humans sat on a garden bench: three old women, hair thin as smoke, all wrapped in thick cardigans despite the late spring sun. Their hands clicked and clacked, gleaming needles in constant rhythm.
The alien tilted his head. Aha, a dialect.
He sat hidden behind a bush, antennae quivering in concentration. The clacking began to resolve, not as random noise but as complex syntax. A chorus of metallic consonants. Loops of grammar. Rows upon rows of repeated clauses.
The grandmothers knitted steadily.
Slowly the sounds revealed their meaning. “We bind beginnings to ends. Every mistake can be unravelled. Holes are inevitable, so we patch them with patterns. Tension keeps the yarn from collapsing.”
He leaned closer, awed.
Hours passed. Birds drowsed on the branches. A nurse wheeled tea into the garden, set cups before the women and wheeled away again. No one spoke.
The alien rose and returned to his vessel. His report would astonish his kind: Humans do not converse with voices. Their language is the click of needles, their philosophy profound:
“Life’s purpose must be stitched from an endless skein of yarn.”
The Knitting Circle (story below)
When the craft slid down through the morning haze, it made no more sound than a sigh. The pilot, small, round, with luminous eyes like water-drops catching light, settled it carefully between the hedge and a birdbath, in a garden fragrant with lavender and moss.
A line of humans sat on a garden bench: three old women, hair thin as smoke, all wrapped in thick cardigans despite the late spring sun. Their hands clicked and clacked, gleaming needles in constant rhythm.
The alien tilted his head. Aha, a dialect.
He sat hidden behind a bush, antennae quivering in concentration. The clacking began to resolve, not as random noise but as complex syntax. A chorus of metallic consonants. Loops of grammar. Rows upon rows of repeated clauses.
The grandmothers knitted steadily.
Slowly the sounds revealed their meaning. “We bind beginnings to ends. Every mistake can be unravelled. Holes are inevitable, so we patch them with patterns. Tension keeps the yarn from collapsing.”
He leaned closer, awed.
Hours passed. Birds drowsed on the branches. A nurse wheeled tea into the garden, set cups before the women and wheeled away again. No one spoke.
The alien rose and returned to his vessel. His report would astonish his kind: Humans do not converse with voices. Their language is the click of needles, their philosophy profound:
“Life’s purpose must be stitched from an endless skein of yarn.”