The Hour Before the Lamps
Black as the inside of a closed door,
black as the cedar when the snow has stopped.
She wove the night itself to lie on
and left the morning out.
Winter comes early above Khenifra, and it comes dark. By five the cedar ridge is a cut-out against a sky the colour of ink, and inside the house the lamp is not yet lit because oil is dear and the eyes know every corner of the room. This is the hour she made this rug for. The Beni M'Guild usually reach for their purples and their reds, but now and then a weaver chooses the colour of that waiting hour and knots a whole floor in it, deep and plain, so that the room settles before the light arrives.
Forty years on, the black has eased toward charcoal and the pile has worn to the depth of a good felt, close and even underfoot. It is a rug for a calm room: pale plaster walls, one low sofa in undyed linen, a brass lamp, and this dark field holding the whole thing still.
Handwoven rugs grow in beauty, memory, and value with every passing year.