Holding Cradle

    Today I thought I would start carving the plates.  I have the 16 inch top and back plates already glued and cut out.  I did that about a year ago.  I bought three sets of tops, backs, and sides and went ahead and joined them all at the same time.  So I thought I would start today, but I forgot that making a 16 inch archtop is different than a 17 inch.  Consequently, I had to make a holding cradle and two clamping cauls.  The holding cradle is what I put the plates in when I carve them.  It gives me something to clamp to the bench and hold on to when I'm using the violin plane and the chisels.  The clamping cauls will be used to join the back and sides to the top plate.  I have included pictures.  The cradle has the white laminate on the top of it.  I've also included pictures of the spruce top and maple back, so you can see where it all starts.  I've got to play tomorrow night at Gaudalupe's if it doesn't snow, but I should be able to start carving Thursday.

      Here is one of my favorite poems.  It was written by Stanley Kunitz who wrote poetry until he was 100 years old.  If you click on the link you can listen to him read this wonderful piece called Touch Me.

Summer is late, my heart.
Words plucked out of the air
some forty years ago
when I was wild with love
and torn almost in two
scatter like leaves this night
of whistling wind and rain.
It is my heart that's late,
it is my song that's flown.
Outdoors all afternoon
under a gunmetal sky
staking my garden down,
I kneeled to the crickets trilling
underfoot as if about
to burst from their crusty shells;
and like a child again
marveled to hear so clear
and brave a music pour
from such a small machine.
What makes the engine go?
Desire, desire, desire.
The longing for the dance
stirs in the buried life.
One season only,
                           and it's done.
So let the battered old willow
thrash against the windowpanes
and the house timbers creak.
Darling, do you remember
the man you married? Touch me,
remind me who I am.