The Red Beside the Bed
One red, and nothing else to say.
The size of a bed, the depth of a hand.
First foot down in the dark,
and the day begins warm.
Not every rug is for the big room. This one was made for the small one: the bedroom off the courtyard where a bride goes the first winter, with a bed the length of this rug and a window the size of a book. She wove it plain, a single deep red with no lattice and no diamonds, because the room was small and the rug was to be felt rather than looked at. The Beni M'Guild do this now and then, one colour all the way across, and it takes more confidence than any pattern.
It is the rug you put your feet on first thing, which is why the two centimetre pile matters and why it has worn so evenly over forty years: every morning, the same two feet, the same place. The red has deepened rather than faded. Beside a low bed in a quiet room with white walls it does one thing, and does it the way it always has.
Handwoven rugs grow in beauty, memory, and value with every passing year.