Brickwork

June 29 2015

The brick is hot to the touch.

In the cool of dusk,

as cool air hugs the ground

and shadows fall,

I bathe in its latent heat,

radiating freely

out into space.

Like a warm body

its closeness comforts me.

I am a contented cat

stretching-out in a patch of sun,

eyes, drifting shut

hypnotically flushed

with heat.

I love the warmth of brick; 

basic red

with a brush of rose, a touch of pink.

Common brick, made of local mud

dug up

from vestigial rivers

exhausted lakes.

The particularity of clay,

as easily traced

as a fingerprint.

I built a hearth from salvaged brick.

An earthy red,

softened by weather

showing its age.

Each, a roughly different shade,

so taken together

the colour is warm, and rich

and restful.

It's a substantial structure,

anchoring the room

with its settled weight.

But the lines are far from straight.

My corners, hardly plumb,

the mortar

a little crumbly.

Because brickwork

is not factory-made;

it reveals the hand of its maker,

the pedigree

of clay.

My red brick fireplace,

warming the house

all night long.

Like the exterior walls

it heats and cools

expands, contracts,

as if slowly breathing

in and out.

Yet steady as rock;

the heaviness of brick

that grounds the house

and anchors the hearth.

And the permanence

of native earth.

The common clay

from which man was made,

formed, and fired

and cemented in place.

As with all things, I didn’t build it myself. But around a woodstove in my basement den, I had it built:  an imposing hearth, made of red recycled brick.

In the poem, I wanted to convey the warmth, the permanence, and the earthiness of brick. There are the obvious references to home and hearth. But there is also this idea of “terroir”. Because brick is too heavy to haul long distances; it’s only practical to use local stuff. So brick is grounding in so many ways:  the feeling of comfort; the steadying weight; its essential connection to the ground itself.

One way I get at this quality is personification:  it’s a warm body, it has fingerprints, it seems to breathe. And in the end, there is the Biblical conflation of man and clay.

And aside from psychological and aesthetic warmth, there is the physical heat of brick. Which is where the poem begins:  standing by a warm wall in the chill of quickly falling dusk.