Sun shafts from the south redden the stony solitude;
The strong septal stone and standing double walls warm;
The wide stone roof is the flat kathedra of time;
The cairn stones now compose the wind-sung enclosure.
To its grass-blade tips, this green field is soul unseen.
The tomb skirts the radiant impenetrable,
A higher meaning permeating the cosmos,
Beyond nature’s fundamental physical laws;
It does not require a god’s certified existence
For a look of wonder to earth epiphany.
Intrinsic value has no periodic chart;
It throbs, like love, in our impulsive eagerness
To be enchanted by stones, stars, space and meaning;
The sublime soaks stony lanes and the Milky Way,
Inescapable awe imbues our star-waste being.
We take the wonder to be objective and real;
In the mud-script of an ancient field read aright,
We return to the mud what we take from the mud;
We recite the poetics of stone to affirm our faith in value,
Renew a seasonal covenant with the gods of meaning.
Here souls sense something deeply moving, yes, numinous,
Belonging to a world that inspires devotion;
It matters utterly that human life goes well,
No matter the mystery that defies account
or the inexhaustible depth of a wedge tomb.
Sunset is a solemn moment of a time past, a time new;
It is not a sure sign of a singular creed;
It is when pilgrims listen to the roadside tales of others;
Voices find solid tone and connection where stone walls whisper;
Where horned sheep straggle shared stories make vulgar gospel.
