Isaac Fletcher Weiss, Chanterelle Knife #2, 2017 (Artist Instagram)
The grip is everything.
Then the swing-back
and journey down,
song of steel
forged in a forge.
Let me do the work.
The marriage
between the body
and the tool,
the way I bend gravity
in your hand.
Before I could build
anything, I had to learn
what God gave me:
a bag full of nails,
the stone
my body becomes
in thought.
Look at the nail
planted like a stem—
what we can build
and take apart.
To make a bird,
you need two birds.
To make a hammer, you need
another hammer, fire
and a handle long
as a neck. Otherwise,
you got no song.