Things of exquisite grace and charm
Sevres – produced tea-services
Of troubled minds, the perfect balm:
Embodiments of the graces.

To gaze at them for a minute
Is to experience a sense
However slight, of the infinite:
Contemplation’s very essence.

A sense of beauty unsurpassed
Of grace and artistry combined;
Heavenly forms in earth recast
And by the craftsmen’s skill refined.

Miraculous in glaze and form
Sublimity of ceramics
Where subtle beauty is the norm
It has its own dynamics.

Of heamatite and cobalt, too
The craftsmen of consummate skill
Did the kaolinite imbue
With colours that enchant us still.

Tony Kelly, Crook