Our Clay - a poem by Naomi Wakan

 

Our clay

Based on the lines by Kuan Tao-Sheng

"I am in your clay

You are in my clay"

Am I in your clay

and you in mine?

I've never thought

of these thirty years

that way; not even once.

I've thought of making

good meals and a comfy home;

flowers from the garden

for the table, a good poem

occasionally, and royalties

to pay the mortgage.

Am I in your clay

and you in mine?

The question makes me uncomfy.

It's too exaggerated for

my English conditioning,

too demanding for something

I had taken for granted.

Still it won't go away,

so I start to count more carefully

the five to ten fruit and veg

I prepare each day,

read the odd book you recommend,

and self-consciously wash

the sheets more frequently.

I have sex a little more than I want,

and plump the pillows every morning.

Am I in your clay

and you in mine?

Still the question remains 

unanswered between us.

Besides the added zest

I am trying to add to each element

of our partnership,

is now attached guilt and shame

and embarrassment at my

somewhat less than perfect love.

Am I in your clay

and you in mine?

The quote has become a koan,

so one dawn I wake

in a fever of failure.

I note you are lying against me,

hand on my breast,

and I have a determined

arm around your shoulders.

Then, in an instant,

I know not how, all dissolves

and I ask myself in confusion,

Whose hand? Whose breast?

Whose arm? Whose shoulders?

And the tears run down over my clay

and your clay, your clay

and mine.

from Wind on the Heath, Naomi Beth Wakan. www.amazon.ca