Holding our Temper
- Details
- Written by Eve Moore
Holding our Temper
Tempering steel
reduces its hardness
and increases not only
its toughness, but its
ability to meet its
intended use.
Making it less
brittle.
Enhancing
its resistance
to deformation.
It makes it
adaptable to
its purpose by
imposing a tensile
elasticity, a deep
and penetrating
plasticity.
Bridges, say.
High-rises.
Springs.
Swords.
Gears
of a found
music box
that plays “…a
few of my favorite
things…"
Mettle.
Only by
heating and
cooling it off,
again and again.
Cycles of exposure
to contrast, unifying,
fusing, if you will, the
physical structure's
crystalline phases in
to a single-phase
microstructure.
This is what makes a
tempered thing stronger,
able to withstand greater
force, pressure, to take
greater load with
out yielding.
Distorting.
Warping.
Giving
way.
A relatively
unchanged
practice since
ancient days—
this heating and
quenching, even
in baths of urine and
blood—to relieve the
internal stresses of iron-
based materials, enabling them
to handle external stresses,
repetitive and unbidden
shocks, without
succumbing.
In general terms,
a material that bends
is less likely to break.
The end result is a
structural integrity
with maximum
“service life."
How long can
it serve, how
resilient can
it be?
Only
repeated
use will
tell.
Bridges
are made
to sway and
flex with winds
and loads.
They are made
to span chasms
and endure
journeys.
They are made
to withstand
the rigors of
their service
to progress.
Especially
to favorite
things.
“Against this cosmic
background the lifespan
of a particular plant or animal
appears, not as a drama complete
in itself, but only as a brief interlude
in a panorama of endless change.”
—Rachel Carson
∞/∞
Eve Moore ©2021
© Photo: Eve Moore
Eve Moore: Once a professional writer of advertising, I saw the light & it has shown me words of a different nature. And so I take them down & offer them up. And all is well.
For more of Eve Moore's amazing and heart centered poetry and writings, click here!
http://www.crystalwind.ca/eve-moore
“When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.”
—Jimi Hendrix
This poem/prose was submitted exclusively to CrystalWind.ca by Eve Moore.
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