The Blind Potter

Poem 71 is not printed among the [original] 70 sonnets for 2 reasons:

1) This is the only poem I would not let my editor see before we were ready to go to the printer, and this work of 70 sonnets was to be a collaboration of her and my input. I did not feel it proper to inject a poem into a co-work without her opinions.

2) I wished to give this poem a special place, not as one of my works, but as a tribute to the person who was very much responsible for seeing this boke and these 'lumps of words' to their present collected form.

Number 71, The Blind Potter, is dedicated to my Editor, Cymbric of the Isles (Kimberly Early-Griffith). She led when I could but feel my way. She gave suggestion and support when I was malcontent and numb, and she stood aside when I needed to be left alone. These works are all children, but Cymbric is the Midwife. Without her, this work would have been in revision until my last earthly day. My thanks and this poem are poor but all I have. It is not adequate, but there is not enough of anything with which to make other token.

Brand McLiam ......................... GregRobin Smith
Madrone, An Tir ........................ Seattle, WA
Nov. AS 25 ................................ Nov. 1991

71 The Blind Potter (or Too, The Reader)

This man of clay has long spun his table
Shaping each vessel from ashes and dust.
Tending the fire that will make each able 
To hold some bit of water in its crust.

Placed upon crammed counters, these lumps of whirls
Find the rest and slow begin to crumble.
Forgotten as they're made, a new one's twirled,
Then glazed, but not fired, then...to the jumble.

Into this foundry comes a believer.
One who does see not just vessels but wine.
"These are amphora filled with the ether
Of most ancient peoples and older times."

So, this blind potter no longer denies
What we do spin here, because of her eyes.