Gabriele Beveridge
2019

 

 

The Glassmaker (For Gaby, an Ekphrasis)

 

       My dearest friend, you killed us with your love

                                                                    You buried us in sand, lit a bonfire 

                                                Birthed us into a window to see through

                                                                   You See

                                     Stillness as an impossibility 

               Maintenance of this pose

                                                            For makers

Who labour on the outskirts, they’re makers

Of interfaces, makers of gluten droplets

Makers of rotten fruit light

Makers of sweet things written in sun ink

Of fluffy boats for preserves and butter

Who hold

The technology of ancient remnants

Of dinner, ash, crumbs, and early mornings

Essentially an art of containment

—However unarmed—

Glassmakers are wizards who translate heat

Perform accidents of love and play tricks 

On depth, only to see flatness better

Who produce darkness but never a void

A void, single mass, dense immensity

In it, there are innumerable globes, challenging

Flatness

No one here’s cast in the other’s likeness

But by way of the forms we wear for others

 Not alone, but in symbiosis

 Alone together

 In serial appraisal

 

 

  • Written on the occasion of Gabriele Beveridge’s exhibition at Native, Perpignan,11 September – 24 September 2019