I was such a weary tourist, part of a group taking in the entirety of Italy in five days, when we walked into a glass-maker's shop in Murano, an island off the coast of Venice. What happened next, I've tried to summarize in text, but the poem I wrote soon after is what is. I've included it at the bottom of this post if you're interested. My experience in Murano provides the context for my awe at finding a Murano chandelier at Beaux Arts Galleria, a showroom and gallery of museum-quality home furnishings and decor in the historic district of Blacksburg, Virginia.
Beaux Arts Galleria, a showroom and gallery of museum-quality home furnishings and decor in the historic district of Blacksburg, Virginia, is hosting an open house.
Beaux Arts Galleria Open House
Thursday, February 11, 4:00 PM - 7:00 PM
R.s.v.p. 540-443-0003
Beaux Arts Galleria is located at 105 East Roanoke Street in Blacksburg, Virginia. Here are directions.
Here's are the full details and invitation to the Beaux Arts Galleria Open House. Here's a story on Handshake 2.0's founder Anne Clelland and Beaux Arts Galleria Accounting Manager Mary Harder, more about the showroom from The Roanoke Times: Beaux Arts prepares for unveiling, and Beaux Arts Galleria on Handshake 2.0.
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Beaux Arts Galleria is a client of Handshake Media, Incorporated, the parent company of Handshake 2.0.
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Quickly, Before Crystals Form
by Anne Giles Clelland
We are patient as we watch you, we pilgrims to Murano.
We have seen you before. You are any man from Venice:
black-eyed, stubble-faced, wool-vested, curly-haired,
leather shoe propped against a column, cigarette in hand.
Your profile is a Roman coin - your brow and nose
jut towards the coin’s rim. We suspect you were hired
right from the Square for today’s exhibit. Your father sired
just the look we need. We think about a group photo.
You hoist a knob of molten glass from the earthen furnace
and wave your blowing iron to keep from spilling
viscous ooze to the floor. Such an amorphous, hot lump
you hold, a primordial syrup of sand, limestone and potash.
The glass glows, writhes, spatters orange.
You roll it into fiery muscles, let it hang limp
as hair. Sea air dampens the walls, clings
to our faces. Rust flakes from your hands.
Glass squeals like nails across our skin and we shift our feet.
Fading, the glass is colorless, transparent
as water, and we wonder if the group before got to see green
instead. Cristallo, you say to us, and lean
on a stool. Steadying the glass, you take up iron tongs.
They enter the glass like forceps, and you draw out
straining forelegs, perfect muzzle, mane, withers, belly, hock
and we groan. Our spines shift as you pull a broad, long
back. Tears course a woman’s cheeks. We see through
the glass. You curve hooves, ears and eyes with a pontil,
crack the horse free and hold it aloft with your tongs.
We want to have the horse. We want to be you.
