No longer burying my head in the sand...

I was once given the most stunning Edwardian girls' needlework book and in it, along with some delightful little embroidery and sewing projects, was a poem entitled The Ostrich and the Silkworm. It was written by Jane Taylor, an English poet and novelist, who wrote the words for Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star in 1806.  She died of breast cancer at the age of 40, her mind still "teeming with unfulfilled projects". Given that my nickname at school was Ostrich, that I am passionate about antique embroidery, textiles and trimmings and that I do indeed have the very mind described, I had what you might call an epiphany and thus a blog was born!

ONE morning an ostrich returning with glee, 

From laying her eggs in the sand, 
Trotted under the boughs of a mulberry tree, 

Where a silk-worm was weaving her band. 

' Good day,' said the worm, wishing much to be heard, 

' Any news in the papers, my dear ?' 
' Who's there is it you, my good friend ?' said the bird ; 

' Why, no, not a line that I hear : 

' Except yes, I met with one comical thing, 

(Design'd, I suppose, for a skit), 
An account of a feather I brush'd from my wing, 

Because it was ruffled and split. 

' And a cone of old silk you had dropt to the ground, 

(Choice articles both, I confess), 
That one of those great human creatures had found, 

And made somehow into a dress : 

' And when it was finish'd (you wouldn't suppose 

Such queer unaccountable pride), 
The creature imagin'd, because of its clothes, 

'Twas better than any beside ! 

' It walk'd to and fro for its fellows to see, 

And turn'd up its nose at the crowd, 
As if it forgot, little cousin, that we 

Had really best right to be proud !' 

' He ! he ! why, you don't tell me so,' said the worm ; 

' Ha ! ha !' said the bird, ' but I do ; 
But I keep you from dinner ; good day to you, ma'am, 

Mind, I don't tell the story for true.'