Pottery->Poetry Kabir
Inside this clay jug | Kabir
Inside this clay jug
there are canyons and
pine mountains,
and the maker of canyons
and pine mountains!
All seven oceans are inside,
and hundreds of millions of stars.
The acid that tests gold is here,
and the one who judges jewels.
And the music
that comes from the strings
that no one touches,
and the source of all water.
If you want the truth, I will tell you the truth:
Friend, listen: the God whom I love is inside.
- Kabir, version by Robert Bly
Pottery->Poetry…. Shattered teacups
Song on Porcelain
Czeslaw Milosz
Rose-colored cup and saucer,
Flowery demitasses:
You lie beside the river
Where an armored column passes.
Winds from across the meadow
Sprinkle the banks with down;
A torn apple tree’s shadow
Falls on the muddy path;
The ground everywhere is strewn
With bits of brittle froth–
Of all things broken and lost
Porcelain troubles me most.
Before the first red tones
Begin to warm the sky
The earth wakes up, and moans.
It is the small sad cry
Of cups and saucers cracking,
The masters’ precious dream
Of roses, of mowers raking,
And shepherds on the lawn.
The black underground stream
Swallows the frozen swan.
This morning, as I walked past,
The porcelain troubled me most.
The blackened plain spreads out
To where the horizon blurs
In a litter of handle and spout,
A lively pulp that stirs
And crunches under my feet.
Pretty useless foam:
Your stained colors are sweet,
Splattered in dirty waves
Flecking the fresh black loam
In the mounds of these new graves.
In sorrow and pain and cost,
Sir, porcelain troubles me most.
Washington DC, 1947
Malcolm Davis
On Dec. 11th, Malcolm Davis died.
When NCECA had it’s convention in Philadelphia, Malcolm Davis gave the closing speech. It was a wonderful and moving speech. Pretty funny in parts, – someone when introduced to him said, “Malcolm Davis? I thought you were a glaze!” I guess all of us shino lovers do indeed have a Malcolm Shino glaze bucket in our studio. His carbon trapped pots have been inspirational.
I listened to the speech again when I heard of his death. Here’s a more serious excerpt that speaks to the question of why we make pots:
“But my greatest personal struggle all these years has been to come to terms with the fact that I left the active struggle for social justice to make pots and dishes for the privileged, adding more clutter to the cosmic dump. Look at the mess we are in: wars in two foreign lands and the global was on terror; an economy in shambles; millions losing their jobs, homes, and health care. Corporate giants control the Congress and the Media. The fragile planet that we so dearly love and so greedily exploit shows signs of imminent demise.
And here we are playing in the mud. Why do we make pots? Why do we work in clay? Does it serve any useful social function? Is it merely self- indulgence? Egotism? Escapism? Privilege? Is our work with clay just selfish, useless, superfluous? Are we just fiddling while Rome burns? As I was preparing these remarks, news arrived about the escalating catastrophe in Haiti, making this conversation once again both urgent and inadequate.”
He later responds:
“I continue to grapple with this question as I continue to make pots. I can do no other, for this journey for me was not so much a matter of choice, as of destiny. What we do with the clay, what we create with our hands, what we offer up from our spirits may not end racism or stop injustice, but it may just help keep our culture human.”
