Metamorphosis of a Plate.

Rubber-ups pounded
patterned tissue
onto my green skin, precise,
glaziers dipped and poured,
dressed me in glass,

at six hundred degrees Celsius, the kill,
clay to pot, irreversible,
chemical and physical
reaction elements white hot
wares glow though the peep
hole, a universe spinning
through my fire, every molecule
bounces and spews
its last drops

thumbed, spun, cast,
within saggars, my bones
fire-licked,
delicate to hard, an odd
man stokes the wood,
holes up the wall,
cooks up breakfast
in a number eight shovel:
bacon and eggs
spluttered in my flames.

Seventy feet high these chimney
kilns, bunged
up to the roof, an oss
to climb rung by rung
to the fancies: ornaments
and souvenirs and tiles
necked up as we vitrify,

some of us just shards
of worse seconds, pin-holed,
not imperfect enough
for a midden
of thirds and lump.