The Urn

The urn can't crack when it's set down,
it's curves are bound for oblivion
and no shattering can forestall that
destiny.  No firing squad or war-
wound can confound its clean line,
there will be no armed comment
on its function or design.

It can't afford not to carry on
because it trumpets its maker's
hands, those long-lost skills
that caressed clay and made it
something else entirely.  It will
bear its time with cheer and an
unbroken line, its cream ceramic
certainty will cheer its silence
and non-use through calamity.

Eventually, untouched and un-
abused, it will likely pay for
the roof over someone's head,
an attic object, buried up to its
neck in self-sufficiency, will pay
for all those ill years, for all
that lack of truth.

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