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Pots
by Christina Fletcher
I think God comes from Mohenjodaro.
We have been making pots
for thousands of years.
I alone must have made
thousands of pots.
In railways stations
chai wallahs sell tea in them.
Then purchasers break them -
one drink, and smash -
back to mud.
This morning, collecting cowpats
to fire surahis for grain and ghee,
I came across elephants by the river
hosing slip across their foreheads -
water and mud.
When sunlight dries slip
in the hollow of an elephant's head
it forms a vessel. When I turn
my wheel is the Cosmos.
Sacred mud.
Lately, there is a fashion
for plastic cups. I try to tell them,
'Plastic is more costly.
What happens to plastic?
My pots go back to mud.'
They answer, 'Customers
don't like your pots. How can we sell
in pots- if customers want plastic?
Make something else.
Go back to your mud.'
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