Enion Made It

David Solway

Take your time. Mix silica and lime by
slow degrees, regulate the flux, whether
ash of brown bracken, briar, beechwood, oak,
or kelp piled in stacks for the alkali.
Avoid crizzeling and frit, you don�t want
cullet dribbling in globules from the lehr�
this is a delicate operation.
If you are hankering for effects, add
soft red lead to the batch instead of lime
to marry the silicates and bring warm
brilliance to the rounded cheek of the glass.
Make sure to roll the gather on a steel
marver and temper at the glory-hole
to breed symmetry and fire-polish, drip
oil into emery powder and fret,
set a small coin into the finial,
flare the bowl and flute the baluster stem
trailing the canes side-on to the ribbed mold,
then stain the colour in with minerals.
Next, work it to a merrythought design�
drop-knops and arabesques of herring-bone�,
prick sprues for liquid gold to trickle in,
then brad the prunts on like cut raspberries
and stud them round with corrugated gems.
Look! The vessel glitters with refractions.
So now you can say: Enion made it.
Here is your patterned goblet from Sidon.

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David Solway's works copyright © to the author.