She lays down bedded
under a black sea,
murky, thick.
A copper plate her bed,
a woodblock her nightstand.

Her dreams scatter magnesium,
the ink turns tacky,
snapping that wrist,
tar-like, it breaks,
as if to say, “I’ve had enough”.

Her basin is an acid bath of rust;
the green hard-ground looks like Jell-O.
Unconscious still, her hands move as they carve,
a pointy stylus hitting the metal to etch
perhaps something literal, or else abstract.

Scraping with the squeegee of color,
wiping the tarlatan of time in circles,
over and over, and over,
that stiff cheesecloth absorbing
a little, then more, and much more.

An hour passes
as the halo inner circle grows,
bright shining to black corners,
blotting out all light.

Dozens of phone book pages
finish the job of clarifying,
diminishing the remains of the surface,
edges wiped clean with rags.

Can you see the city?
Can you see the wraiths?
The old cabin in the woods?
The birds flying over rivers?

The smell of vinegar and Simple Green
fill the air of the studio.
She forgets to eat.
The old man thinks.

Inspired of Japan by the sea,
this art of carving,
this art of ageless reproduction,
the Great Wave in every textbook,
the foggy mountains like fingers
sticking up and disappearing in patches.

Writing so ancient,
seals of the scholars
and emperors,
a respect of the handiwork,
as all printmakers learn,
during Asian customs
when they ask one’s profession.

A timeless form
wrought of patience,
making shapes into permanency,
figurative and abstract,
pitch and flash,
lino and wood,
copper and stone,
on papers so thin and huge,
or else tiny,
as if for a love letter.

Imagine a man and woman,
scratched like muses
lost in each other
under that bridge,
where swans float,
stones never wash away,
and in ripples of silence,
lovers never die.

For the block remains,
and ink secures their future,
waiting to come to life,
for thousands of years yet.

And the old man
and she who dreams,
tell stories
in ocean and valleys,
in animals and trees,
as they separate something from nothing,
creators with black stains under their nails,
the grooves forever their voice.

Prints by Danae Wilkin on lino and copper plates
Bridge woodblock by Hiroshige