Earth's Porcelain Clearing Poem by Irene Mitchell

No grief, only gladness for now, for now
there is a porcelain clearing on fragile Earth
which widens to a wild complexity
having many angles but none sharp,
a sheen but no finish.

Everyone to table.It is laid for lunch —
wine, bread, manchego cheese in its wrap,
a knife, a jug in shadow upon a slab.

I am painting how art lays bare
old and new, sublime in color and compaction.

I am underscoring how the porcelain center's
fixative guards against smudging, grounds the whole
like a lunch eaten, envied, enjoyed,
made much of.

To the depiction of bread and cheese, I will add
a walnut,
for I am the constructor of this plate
and will make it desirable.