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Home  »  Poetry: A Magazine of Verse  »  Lyon Sharman

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Porcelains

Lyon Sharman

From “Designs in Chinese Color”

THERE are porcelains a-plenty wrought by skill,

Hard as jade, sweet-toned as a bell,

In a hundred shapes that tradesfolk sell:

Wine-cups, rice-bowls, lanterns, plates,

Tea-pots, snuff-bottles, vases with mates.

There are porcelains a-plenty wrought by skill.

There are porcelains made by no man’s will—

Miracles, they, of the kiln and fire,

Outwitting dreams, outrunning desire;

Fashioned when genii blew the coals;

Decreed for the reverence of men’s souls.

There are porcelains made by no man’s will.