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Autumn’s breath clings to the trunk.
Todeschina, with slackened breast, sits
slumped in pensive thought upon a bench
of mulberry wood. Morus Alba, beloved
of silkworms. Another age, another time.
Her life cut short, no descendants
did she bear, none to see the silk mills
nor the toil within. Silk spinners,
or ‘bigatis’ in the Friulian tongue;
women smelling of heat and treadmills,
strung like pearls across the factory
floors, consuming and consumed by the
life of silkworms. Hurrah for progress.
They are the silks of the Orient,
who velvety traverse the Age of
Enlightenment and revolution, departing
from here, the medieval Friulian
stronghold of the Arcano nobles,
to return bearing Chinese plants,
khaki and mulberry, to calm the ardours
of the soul.
osorom
design Konstantin Grcic
2003
OS017
