Creation..........Warning...Epic Poem Alert

Creation

The world is made new,
again and again,
from ancient things made new.

I’d like to shape lumps of clay
and have them turn into stone
hard usefulness.
For I am a practical woman
who loves both the shape
and function of a hand made
thing.

I would like to take it
from the dry powdered clay,
(for that’s what you get to be
when you’re old rock worn
down into its myriad pieces),
and mix it with water,
splashing water,
to quench
its parched form
.
I’d play in that mud
that cool slippery squishy
mud oozing through
my fingers
encasing possibility
and painting my hands grey
as if I were ancient rock
fire born too.

I’d smell the scent of earth
Ancient Earth,
born in fire
when none marked time.
I’d smell it,
taste it,
as it landed on my lips.
I’d taste eternity,
something older
than any living thing.

Then,
I’d take it and give it form.
My hands commanding its shape,
its being.
But, being myself
only myself so young,
I can only give it the semblance
of its true form
as I return it to fire again
stained with pigments
to please my fancy,
until I can hold it in my hands,
glad of it’s form and use.
Pour in earth colored
ancient brew,
I’d drink in
my morning with
ancient earth
made new.

The world is made new, again and again…

Then again,
let me create in its liquid
beauty
Glass.
Let me thaw it from its
frozen form and warm it,
freeing from the chill
of this place,
this air,
this sand
Phoenix born in fire
then captured

I would watch this liquid
flowing so slowly it
captures the semblance
of solidity.

Glass,
colors itself .
Blushes
with elements
that dissolve in it
as other things melt in water,
becoming its partner,
but separate still in its
solid liquidity,
the elements floating within
creating sublime color,
as if light has been captured
from broken prisms.

Each piece of glass
is a bubble
held in suspension
until popped
as all bubbles are.

Did you know
If you hang a pane
of glass in a frame
for a century
or two (or so),
the glass will flow,
making a puddle
at the bottom of the
bubble’s frame
until the top is so thin
it loses it’s shape
and shatters.

But I would not work
in large pieces.
Small things,
shiny things
give me delight.
No, for me,
I’d rather take the bits
left over
from bigger things,
or broken things,
remeltig
reheating and reshaping
into a droplet,
A bead., a ball,
A piece to fit your hand
or string together in harmony
To capture light itself…

I would work in smallness
close to the droplet
liable to get splashed
now and again.
What’s a few burned fingers?
I want to make new
beauty,
have it flow through
my hands,
filling my eyes,
with liquid light
broken light.
Fill my
ears with tinkle,
and harmony’s
chime,
.

Glass,
it is a
glorious liquid
who flows in its own time.

I wonder,
if a being living
in the turgid liquid
(like a fish)
(but not)
would see us as mere
flashes
splashes
dashing by?
What stories
or colors
do they create?

The world is made new, again and again…

Then again,
perhaps I could
sing my creation,
draw it out of air,
shared breath and breathing,
movement
and form ephemeral,
complete in itself
but relying on
those vessels,
living thought
and voices.

With words and tone
create the song,
the song creating
the breath.
What pictures created
in mind and soul,
of creatures great
and tiny,
in feather’d breasts,
scale covered ribs,
fur and hair covered hearts
and minds.

Would it exist
in memory
or spirit,
when the last
voices fail to sing?

Or will the song
remain?
Its pigmentless art
creating pictures
from modulated
sound waves
each changed,
added voice
by voice
and breath,
air and
surroundings,
the soundboards
reverberating
and amplifying,
transmitting,
permitting
shared dream

So ephemeral are
those dreams
shared,
lost by waking
slipping from
mental grasp.

Yet memories
infected by sound
and dream
and love
and heart,
live
from generation
to generation
reborn.

The world is made new, again
and again.

Then again,

Perhaps I could raging
fire reign.
Pouring the strength
of earth,
fire born,
sweat wrested
from silent bed,
heated with ageless
black stone burning,
air cooled
water quenched
pounded with muscle
and thought
into what is wrought
beauty, strength,
utility
bound into folded
layers of red tinged
oxygen oxidation
bathed in flame.

Then, could I pound
out ringing song
within my hand
hammer grasping
arms burning
sweat pouring
breath gasping
my strength tied
within the worked
amalgam, shaped
by heat and heart
pulled, pounded
teased and touched
by no human hand
yet formed
in human creation.

The world is made new again and again.

Poem.. Together

Together

Together we morn,
not just the born unborn,
but those never conceived
except in dream.

And alone we are
in the eyes of those
who only exist in the eyes
of those they've born,
those who wonder if we exist
within their world of Mother,
never knowing the loss we've born,
carried beneath our hearts.

Together we live,
loving the others born
to those we love and knowing
that they bear our future too,
and never forgetting those we've born,
Unborn.

Nancy France, December 17, 2004

Dedicated to Val, who now has born a living heart.