klara[dot]nz

I am a brick.

Clay, little sand, no soil.

Heated to more than a thousand degrees.

Left to sit in the glow.

Dried out.

Put on a shelf with millions of others.

Left for days.

At least I am solid.

Red, though spotted where the sand pushed through.

If this were a different kind of kiln, some

would break in the firing.

Alas, but it is not.

There is no pop to punctuate the monotony of flame--

The roar of a metronome.

I have no glaze.

No glass will melt on my skin.

In this way, I am alone.

When I will be cold, it would break.

But it won't do that either. I am not so cruel.

While my blood is hard to see against that

backdrop of red, it is hard still when I

keep it in my core.

A spot of clay unfired.

Perhaps it will become a structural flaw.

Level 2 cordoned off - jacks placed,

building repaired. Replaced.

Maybe I'll be a path, and it will go

unnoticed.

Maybe even I shall be thrown haphazardly

from the window of a moving car.

I could cushion the impact, shield

someone or something,

By yielding more than most of my kind.

Perhaps I wish to be outrageous.

To live beyond my station, to deny some

bold claim of insignificance; to matter.

But then again, without bricks i find, too often, I

Would be tumbling

As if down a well

Perhaps down a well

Down a well

To the bottom of a stack

I've been aloft in.

What is it they say,

"If I have been further,

It is by standing on the shoulders of

giants"?

I am a brick;

My parents are the flame.