Vessel
To be colored in metallic salt,
dipped in cobalt
blue, rakus
flame-tamed hues
equatorial smoke and wintry water.
To reside in luster:
illicit gods chamber-
quarantined gold.
To be the stonesmall, in blindfold,
pressed to the vessels
burnished sides. To be the pestles
love against the mortar:
plot of glaze, guise of feldspar.
To be the shard-skin:
glass cast-out of manganese, iron, livid tin.
To be the callow body
vitrified in journey
near catastrophe:
something new arises out of desire
of water, earth and furtive-fettered fire.
Valerie Wohlfeld
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This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 21 Number 3 , on page 42
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