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(p.s. drag me!!!!!)
The Potter
Ever since technology had come to their
town,
the ceramic purpose of her life had undergone
some undoing. Syv still made pots, but barely.
There was this app where you could scale a bowl
to your liking, liken it to a piece you might have seen
in Syv’s shop. Color it with preference, and then order it
via the app. And it came in a week. Everyone
could be a potter, suddenly, and pots and bowls
and vases were now made with swipes
and a certain kind of refined pinching
of the thumb and index finger. Syv contemplated
the value of finger versus hand dexterity. It
was a more complicated issue than just that,
obviously, as working the wheel concerned more
than just the hands—it was the hands, fingers, the toes
barely pressing on pedal, the arms in a very specific
hug, perhaps the most intentional hug that could
ever be given, Syv contended. It was the time of day
that a bowl asked to be made. It was the clay
demanding to be shaped while the light pursed
in through the clouds, but barely. It was the fact
that Matt had broken Syv’s heart when she was twenty
and in Portugal, so she had dropped her phone
in the most intentional way possible onto the concrete
of the sidewalk. It was that a potter was nearby,
taking a smoke break and watching Syv break
her phone with intentionality. It was that Syv
had no way of getting back to her hotel so the potter
generously offered to call a cab with his phone,
his phone back at the studio. It was that pushing
the clay around on the spinning disk felt purposeful
and extremely important, like the most
important task in the world. It was that Syv
had never known anything else but brokenness.
She always started a bowl this way: in concert
with the clay, a left hand steady, in position, ready
for anything, and the right one taking a leap
into darkness, pushing forward, upward, with
upmost certainty, pushing and breaking the seal.
It was the moment of surprise when something,
anything, was miraculously made.
the ceramic purpose of her life had undergone
some undoing. Syv still made pots, but barely.
There was this app where you could scale a bowl
to your liking, liken it to a piece you might have seen
in Syv’s shop. Color it with preference, and then order it
via the app. And it came in a week. Everyone
could be a potter, suddenly, and pots and bowls
and vases were now made with swipes
and a certain kind of refined pinching
of the thumb and index finger. Syv contemplated
the value of finger versus hand dexterity. It
was a more complicated issue than just that,
obviously, as working the wheel concerned more
than just the hands—it was the hands, fingers, the toes
barely pressing on pedal, the arms in a very specific
hug, perhaps the most intentional hug that could
ever be given, Syv contended. It was the time of day
that a bowl asked to be made. It was the clay
demanding to be shaped while the light pursed
in through the clouds, but barely. It was the fact
that Matt had broken Syv’s heart when she was twenty
and in Portugal, so she had dropped her phone
in the most intentional way possible onto the concrete
of the sidewalk. It was that a potter was nearby,
taking a smoke break and watching Syv break
her phone with intentionality. It was that Syv
had no way of getting back to her hotel so the potter
generously offered to call a cab with his phone,
his phone back at the studio. It was that pushing
the clay around on the spinning disk felt purposeful
and extremely important, like the most
important task in the world. It was that Syv
had never known anything else but brokenness.
She always started a bowl this way: in concert
with the clay, a left hand steady, in position, ready
for anything, and the right one taking a leap
into darkness, pushing forward, upward, with
upmost certainty, pushing and breaking the seal.
It was the moment of surprise when something,
anything, was miraculously made.