etymologophilia

tantra
type of Hindu religious book, 1799, from Skt. tantram, lit. "loom, warp," hence "groundwork, system, doctrine," from tan "to stretch, extend," from PIE base *ten- "to stretch, extend" (see tenet).
tantric
1905, from tantra + -ic; used loosely in the West to denote erotic spiritualism.

sutra
"series of aphorisms," 1801, from Skt. sutram "rule," lit. "string, thread" (as a measure of straightness), from sivyati "sew;" cognate with L. suere "to sew" (see sew). Applied to rules of grammar, law, philosophy, etc., along with their commentaries.

As in suture.

thread (n.)
O.E. þræd "fine cord, especially when twisted" (related to þrawan "to twist"), from P.Gmc. *thrædus (cf. M.Du. draet, Du. draad, O.H.G. drat, Ger. Draht, O.N. þraðr), from suffixed form of base *thræ- "twist" (see throw). Meaning "spiral ridge of a screw" is from 1670s. The verb meaning "to put thread through a needle" is recorded from mid-14c.; in reference to film cameras from 1913. The dancing move called thread the needle is attested from 1844. Threads, slang for "clothes" is 1926, Amer.Eng.

spinner
early 13c., "spider," agent noun from spin. Meaning "person who spins textile thread" is from late 14c.

purl (v.)
"knit with inverted stitches," 1825; earlier "to embroider with gold or silver thread" (1520s), from M.E. pirlyng "revolving, twisting," of unknown origin. The two senses usually are taken as one word, but this is not certain.

clue
1590s, phonetic variant of clew "a ball of thread or yarn," with reference to the one Theseus used as a guide out of the Labyrinth. The purely figurative sense of "that which points the way" is from 1620s. The verb meaning "to inform someone of the important facts" is attested by 1934.

mitosis
1887, coined from Gk. mitos "warp thread" (see mitre) + Mod.L. -osis "act, process." Term introduced by German anatomist Walther Fleming (1843-1905) in 1882. So called because chromatin of the cell nucleus appears as long threads in the first stages.

flower thread jumble-brain

Sometimes the beauty of the materials I work with supersedes the beauty of what I make from them. I diminish them by narrowing their vast potential into an object. I feel this especially about yarn and embroidery floss. And poetry; what lines can equal the glorious potential of the alphabets and sounds? Adeena Karasick refers to letters of the alphabet as "wriggly insignias." What could be a better representation of wriggly insignias than these twirling curly ringletty whorls of skeins?

The floss I use for cross-stitching is Danish Flower Thread. Flower thread is the generic name for non-glossy cotton embroidery thread; Danish Flower Thread (Dansk Blomstergarn) is the official thread used by the Danish Handcraft Guild (Håndarbejdet's Fremme). When I come across it in the US I used to buy out the store's supply because I considered it such a rarity, but now that I live in Minneapolis, a city that fetishizes its Scandinavian immigrant heritage, I've got a steady source at Ingebretsen's Scandinavian Gifts. In fact, I can't possibly in my lifetime use up the flower thread I've already got.

This need for over-abundance suggests also the addict's itch for color, materials, textures, the desire to bury my fingers in skeins and loops and exultations of spun and spinnable yarn-thread-stuff, to revel in it immersively forever without any pretense toward mastery.

This photo only begins to suggest the squirmy, wormy, brainlike lump of vibrant life of embroidery materials.