Читать книгу Bone Black - Carol Rose GoldenEagle - Страница 16

The early morning finds Wren alone and working in her studio, unable to return to bed.

And what will these hills witness this morning? Wren thinks as she, ever so slowly, wraps the tiny being in cloth, into a delicate, two-inch mound that reminds Wren of the tadpoles she used to capture from the slough when she was a girl. She uses a soft piece of red broadcloth to cover the baby she’ll never meet, the baby she’ll never see grow. Wren places these sacred remains in a small cereal bowl she recently fired in her kiln, the first of many baby pieces she’d planned to make. She remembers a story told by her kohkum years ago about how red is the one colour to which the spirit world is attracted. This morning, she hopes it’s her kohkum cradling this never-born soul, her unborn baby, and offering comfort to them both.

Wren decides during these early morning hours that she will incinerate the baby’s remains in the electric kiln in her studio. Her way of remembering. Maybe she will then make a colourful planter so that baby’s remains will be a part of new growth, new life, some type of perennial plant like a lily or a tulip. Or maybe she will plant an aloe vera and use its soothing gel any time she has an inevitable kiln mishap that causes a minor burn. Her unborn baby could help her through that.

Wren reaches into a second swaddling of red cloth close at hand amid a wicker basket. Inside this new piece is a mixture of tobacco leaves and sage—two plant elements she uses during prayer. She asks for a safe journey home for the spirit of the baby who has left this world. She asks for forgiveness and understanding from the spirit world because what she plans to do with baby’s remains is done from love. Wren decides she will add what is left after burning to the clay and shape it into a colourful vase. She will decorate it with an ornate design of summer wildflowers. The vase will sit beside the large window facing east, a place from which to greet the morning sun and new beginnings.

But new beginnings for what?

Wren brushes a salty tear from her cheek. Her grief is staggering as she throws a ball of clay on her potter’s wheel. She adds slip casting and as the wheel turns, Wren lovingly fashions the middle of the ball with both thumbs so the round blob can begin to move upward into shape. Her tears flow fast now and begin to fall on her creation, becoming part of it. A memory in stone. A large-tiered and layered remembrance in clay for a baby she’ll never meet.