Obscurum per Obscurius

Obscurum per Obscurius
"the obscure by means of the more obscure"

It seems to me you need a concept
so obscure no one will admit
when they don't get it.
Take the woman who sits
embroidering beneath a roof of shears.
Patrons speak in reverential tones--
Clotho, with Atropos above, says one
to his companions.
Or maybe she's Penelope,
biding time till dark.
The artist, bent above her task,
serenely moves her needle in and out,
creating something white on white
that only she can see.
But maybe that's what art is:
a woman, seeming unawares,
stitching threads that mean only
what she wants for them to mean.
Every morning, in the darkness of my room,
I bend above these keys, hoping
to create anything at all,
stitching thoughts with whatever
makes this ink that is not ink
on this page (that's not a page,
but place card of invention).
Every day -- my nod to the obscure
before I move away, leaving home for work,
scissoring my hands before my face
to stop the unseen thread of a web
before it catches me.
She must have sewn in darkness all alone.
It makes me wonder, why do we call it art
only when we have to try too hard?