Osmosis
Crossing crags and hard-stone ridges,
Following ancient paths and causeways
Through fields and farms,
Henges, hills and hollows,
Wandering this island end-to-end
I feel an ancient architecture trapped below me
Deep buried archaeology,
Secrets of a hidden history
Of forgotten times, unknown
Held within the ground
Not only kings and courtiers
But the common people,
Their too- short, brutal lives
Marrows eaten out by hardship
Eking out frail, precarious existence,
For but an instant in time, the blinking of an eye
And quickly gone, returned to dirt and dust
Into the soil from which they sprang
Not coins, swords and buckles
Bubbling unbidden to the surface,
Nor any tactile objects, much rusted,
But whispers of daring deeds, untold tales
And the very breath that made them happen,
Are sealed and captured,
Absorbed, rooted in the earth
Ghosts of warriors, heroes, villains,
Their blood spilt aeons ago,
Still walking, faint and shadow-like,
Frozen voices and old, old stories
Of love and death, of peace and war,
Of deception and deceit, valour and victory,
Religious faith confessed and then renounced,
And their once-hot, raw emotions
Scattered to the winds
Then settled upon the soil,
Desiccated within the crust
Buried in this landscape where I grew
And drew nurture
Survive those self-same atoms,
Elemental memory of peoples,
Making me true descendant of the past
And living still within my bones and blood
No comments:
Post a Comment