To shrink towards a core is to cork. This energy is relative. Negatively viewed, it is to lose water, or shrivel. Positively viewed, the same energy gives concentration, weightlessness and shelter in the protective space of a kirk, a church, which holds both a community and air but does not flow away. The process is protective and is united in the cork of oak bark and its use to seal an age wine.

Black haws, corked.