The Crone and the Tapestry

The ageless tapestry of life and the weaving of mankind into the fabric of time itself.

The Old Woman and the Tapestry



In the far, far away there is an ancient Forest so old that time has forgotten it. This forest is so deep and dark that light can not find it, and because time has forgotten it there is no end or beginning.

This can not be! said the Creator for there must be a beginning and end of things. So the Creator set within the center of this deep and dark forest an old Crone and her dog. The old Crone would not go alone for the forest was too dark and too deep and too lonely for one to sit for ages.
Because the old woman could not sit upon the ground for her bones ached and her joints would not bend as they did when she was young, she was given a rocking chair to sit and a loom to weave life’s tapestry and many bundles of thread.
Her job was to create the tapestry of time so that this age could end and another begin. Beside her was her dog, always sleeping content to be next to the warmth of the fire and the Crone who would occasionally speak to him of visions of life as she added them to the tapestry.

Before them was a fire with a large black pot in which she would gather root and flower to make the colors of life. She would put them in the pot and then add thread to be colored. From time to time she would stop her weaving and slowly get up and walk toward the pot and stir the thread.
Now the dog who could always be found sleeping next to her as she sat and weaved he never left his spot but, when the old woman would get up to tend the fire of life that sat in the center of the deep dark forest so that life would continue for a time, the dog would secretly grab a thread of the tapestry and unravel it then take his place quietly back next to her chair.

The old woman would finish stirring the pot and turn and walk slowly back to her chair and begin to weave her tapestry once again. The dog seeing this would smile lightly and close his eyes to sleep, because the dog knew that on the day the old women finished the tapestry the world, the old woman and the dog would disappear.