The love of wood, the smell, the heft
\nwhether split or sawn, adzed or planed
\npolished or varnished, raw or painted or stained
\nsanded or milled or bark-on or weathered
\nall gathers with exposure:
\nlong years reaching for the sun delving
\ntapping for moisture winters mulling
\nthe idle drifting thoughts of trees
\ndreams that establish themselves in the
\ntwisting journeys in a red and pale journal
\netched in the code of slowly inscribed time
\nhusking over thicker bark after occasional
\nflash fires thin out the lessers, clear space
\nuntil finally the woodsman brings it down
\nto begin its physical journey downhill
\nout onto the ice to wait for spring
\nthen down river to the cove where
\nthe log boom arranges the herringbone
\nfinally selected by a pick from a peevee
\nfed up the clicking clacking jackladder
\nto the carriage where it is rough-sliced into
\nplanks, which soon make their way to a barn
\nwhere they sit, piled flat, airing and drying
\nuntil over time all but one are dispersed
\nand this one sits for ages, finally ends up
\nyears later in a lot of odd boards sold
\nto empty a barn.<\/p>\n
My hand plane is a lovely tool: maple body
\nwith a slot chiselled by hand to perfectly
\nreceive the frog, which receives the plane iron
\nthe plane iron cap, all held in place by the lever cap
\nbut of these most important is the plane iron
\nwhich must be sharpened perfectly and sweetly
\nthis I learned in a class given at night by
\na man who knew and seeing I wanted to learn
\nthis one thing and was serious about it
\nkindly took the time to teach me
\nhow to grind the iron hollow on a grinder
\nhow to set up the sharpening stone with oil
\nhow to place the iron on the stone just so
\nhow the oil squeezes out when it is right
\nhow to be patient with the circular motion
\nhow to test the edge and finally know
\nit is ready to use.<\/p>\n
I had this old rough-cut but very heavy board
\nthat I had bought as part of a lot of boards
\nmostly basswood and oak and maple and ash
\nbut this was heavier very rough-sawn
\ngrey with age but not split and very straight
\nI carried it over to the trestles and laid it flat
\nit was at least two inches thick, a foot wide
\nabout twelve feet long: solid whatever.<\/p>\n
I adjusted the iron of my plane to take
\njust a slight cut into the wood, just a hint
\nI slid it along the rough plank, hearing it
\nsnick-snick-snick over the curved kerf gouges
\nsome circular saw had left in a quick pass ages ago
\nthe fresh wood was surprisingly pinkish
\nmaking the grey old skin look greenish
\nI took long snick-snick passes over the
\nridges on the old plank gradually peeling
\nchips of old grey away revealing swirls
\nof rich pink and red wood glowing as if
\nbreathing again longer and longer
\nbecame my strokes until finally I was taking long curls off the whole length of the plank
\ncontinuous curls reeled off the whole side of the plank was gleaming pink orange red
\nI turned the plank over and continued
\npeeling off the rough old skin revealing
\nthe rich underlying dreams and all the while
\nthe pungent aroma of the fresh wood
\nsang to me until finally out of the ankle-
\ndeep layer of grey and pink had emerged
\nthe gleaming rich simple plank that was to be
\nthe top band of wainscoating in my home<\/p>\n
I left the slight unevenness of the blade’s
\nprogress on the wood, unsanded but smooth
\nand I waxed it and let it be<\/p>\n
wood<\/p>\n
history<\/p>\n
tradition<\/p>\n
wondrous<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The love of wood, the smell, the heft whether split or sawn, adzed or planed polished or varnished, raw or painted or stained sanded or milled or bark-on or weathered<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-creative-writing","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}