Here is a piece written for the dVerse Poets Pub “Prosery” challenge. For those unfamiliar, the Prosery challenge invites writers to craft a piece of flash fiction or prose of exactly 144 words, incorporating a specific line from a poem—in this case, the haunting phrase “lips forget what they have kissed” (by Toni Morrison).
This piece also serves as a thematic nod to the story “Clay and Memory” from the collection Folklore and Flesh, exploring the terrifying permanence of the earth versus the fleeting nature of the body.
Vessel
The kiln fires us into being, but the heat steals our names. We are hollow vessels, spun from wet earth and old ghosts, waiting to be filled. I trace the cracks in my ceramic skin, seeking the potter’s fingerprint, that first violent touch of creation. You claimed the body is a landscape, etched by wind and rain, but erosion is a thief. It smooths the sharp peaks of grief into a flat, unmoving plain.
My mind is a sieve, losing water and time, unable to hold the shape of who I was before the firing. It is a terrifying mercy that the lips forget what they have kissed, yet the mouth remains forever shaped by the words it once whispered.
We crumble back to dust, and in the silence of the soil, the clay finally remembers what the living flesh could not hold true.
Thank you for visiting with me. For more Poetry or Literature related content, visit my blog at The Ritual.
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