25 Tir 1405
Quatrain 36 of 75
“For in the Market-place, one Dusk of Day,
I watch'd the Potter thumping his wet Clay:
And with its all obliterated Tongue
It murmur'd—"Gently, Brother, gently, pray!"”
Reflection · Summer 1405
The summer market-place at dusk is full and hot and the potter's hands are quick and practiced. The clay is being thumped with the efficiency of a craftsman at peak season, and its murmur — gently, brother — may be harder to hear above the noise of summer commerce. But it is there. The all obliterated tongue, barely audible, asking for the care that is owed to anything that was once something else.
Gently in summer means: don't let the season's pace destroy your awareness of what you are working with. Every person, every material that comes through your summer hands has been something else and will be something else again. Handle it accordingly.