<html aria-label="message body"><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div dir="auto" style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; color: rgb(54, 55, 55); line-height: 26px; font-size: 22px;"><span>The Cup That Leans A Little</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; color: rgb(54, 55, 55); line-height: 26px; font-size: 22px;">The bowl shaped by hands<br>not the wheel,<br>allows the clay<br>to sag, to ripple,<br>to hold the trace<br>of touch and fire. </p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; color: rgb(54, 55, 55); line-height: 26px; font-size: 22px;">A potter shapes the bowl<br>with his own natural<br>beautiful hands.<br>And leaves a ridge,<br>a roughness—<br>and in that roughness<br>the bowl remembers<br>the mountain clay,the river silt,</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; color: rgb(54, 55, 55); line-height: 26px; font-size: 22px;">the smoke of the kiln.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; color: rgb(54, 55, 55); line-height: 26px; font-size: 22px;">When you hold it,<br>your fingers feel<br>the small unevenness<br>where beauty hid itself.<br>Where the potter wavered<br>The cup leans a little.<br>It is alive —<br>as the wind is alive.<br>The moon on still water<br>is never the same twice.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; color: rgb(54, 55, 55); line-height: 26px; font-size: 22px;">Rain, the wind<br>find the flaw<br>in the roof tile —<br>and sing.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; color: rgb(54, 55, 55); line-height: 26px; font-size: 22px;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>- Rod McIver</p></div></body></html>