Everyday Poetry

Creating pottery is great exercise. You lug around 20-plus pounds. of somewhat moist clay in the form of a substantial brick and plop it on a flat surface. Then you cut off a chunk by slicing the brick with wire. Then, take that and slap it down on another flat surface. Keep folding it from the surface, kneading it a bit, and slapping it down again, over and over, until you are senseless.

This is very therapeutic, as you can imagine. At his point, you can use the pottery wheel, hand-build by coiling clay “snakes,” or make a slab and shape it.