The Potter's Wheel

I throw my life upon the wheel,

Not at the centre of anything,

But part of the movement,

The rhythm and the noise...

The wheel is gathering momentum

And the clay domes in my hands;

You can feel every change

Right in the fingertips.

Again and again on the treadle,

As the shape grows,

Catching ambient sound

In its hollow,

Resonating like a seashell.

Hunched and twisted,

I suffer the torments

When the euphoria is gone.

Here, there is no thinking,

Only doing,

All I am is what my hands know,

What they remember.