My Hoi An pot
This little pot from the Hoi An hoard was made over half a millennium ago,
From a ship that sank around 1480
In a place so stormy it’s called the Dragon sea.
Already beneath the waves when Henry VII won his throne,
Sleeping on the sea bed through all Henry VIII’s travails
When Elizabeth’s ships overcame the Armada,
Through Stuarts, revolution and restoration, German Georges,
When Victoria’s empire swept the world, this little pot was just swept by sea currents, settling sand.
Through Ming dynasties, empires, China’s revolution, when wars raged above, it lay quietly in its shipwreck in the South China Sea.
And now this modest capsule of history
Lies in my hand, resonating
With all that happened overhead.
LMC 25.12.2020
