Clay, because I finally played tennis on it

So: Adam breathed it and became a soul.
Sumerians scraped it when they needed words.
Egyptians fired it for the sake of birds
While bruised Achilles decorated bowls,
Its finer particles a second skin,
Its cavity of worship a wet mouth
Stained by the spinning of an earthen lathe,
Where void devours memory in its engine.

So it preserves the history of its race
In heroes, hieroglyphs, first causes, gods;
Those are the language of defeated lives.
Today I walked on clay, and taught its clods
The pleasure of my motion; how to trace
Forgetfulness in all that time survives.