Rough and smooth: tea meditation

Pursuit of Spark

Steady rain this morning. Chose my favorite rainy day teabowl by Sammy Chung, with clouds incised in wisps of white slip. Today what I fell in love with was the foot of the bowl, tall enough to protect my hand from the hot tea and deliciously rough to the touch because the dark clay is full of grog (which spellcheck wanted to write as frog, but that is completely ridiculous). What delighted me was the contrast - under the gray celadon glaze the body of the bowl is so smooth, and then, surprise, my fingers encounter the grit of the raw clay foot. A couple of sparrows searches under the false sunflowers for dropped seeds, chirping and jostling the long stems which made the seedheads dance in the rain.