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An Ode to Glass

Joseph Preziosi

 

From dust you came,

 

Fashioned from fine particles of sand.

A molten syrup burns bright amber.

Poured, blown, twisted and pressed,

Within the fiery stone oven, your purpose is born.

New forms take shape at the craftsman’s command.

 

Were you made to offer sight to the short-sighted?

Or to pour the drunkard’s choice of liquid death?

Perhaps you live to reflect the narcissist’s favorite image,

Or to display the garden’s bouquet or time’s ticking hands.

 

But I believe your true purpose is to shatter,

To fall from the careless hand and burst against the cold, hard ground.

Your demise slices the flesh of your owner,

Yet it reminds them of the fragility of their existence.

Death looms ever near, grinding glass and lives into particles of matter,

 

And to dust you return.

 

 

Joseph Preziosi is a senior majoring in Political Science and Criminal Justice. He is from East Brunswick, New Jersey. He will graduate from the Rutgers School of Arts and Sciences in May of 2023. This poem was written in Paul Blaney’s Intro to Creative Writing course in the spring semester of 2022. Blaney selected the piece for inclusion in WHR.