on the cold hearth Poem, by pontefract, at My poetic side

The lathe turns cold.

A mountain of ash

where the summit stood,

and every stroke of the gouge

a quiet bereavement.

A Refraction on the Cold Hearth

Pity the timber, yes—

caught in the lathe’s cold turning,

pruned of its crown before it knew

what it wanted to reach.

Where once the mountain peak held sacred heights,

now only cedar dust drifts across the hearth.

The statuary form was promised in the grain,

a classical posture, carved to speak in light.

Yet the knife’s grace is a quiet violence:

that shears the marble contour into tinder,

spending the noble heartwood just to catch a flame.

What remains is symmetry in exile.

The altar fires of the height are reduced to this—

a brief, shivering flare against the frost,

consuming the very form that sought to endure.

🏔️

on the cold hearth