metal · native element, ductile, soft
the colour of the kettle on the kitchen stove that someone has kept
polished for forty years. the colour of dawn in a country where the sun
comes up over water. the colour of a coin half-buried in dust.
copper is the warmest of the metals and the most willing to age. it
starts as a small fire and ends as tarnish — the green-grey patina that
only the patient ones love. between those two ends, copper lives in
every door handle and every wire and every candleholder in the building.
it conducts. it carries. when you put your hand on it, it remembers you
for a while.