Castlerigg

What do they say, these old cronies, hobnobbing
in their familiar order, always on terms
with Nature and the gods? What are the thoughts
always rising from the richest of fields,
with a Valhalla skyline all around?

None of them tells for what they were assembled,
for prayer and ritual, or a cattle show,
a stone-axe market . . . was it for words of time,
a calendar, a writing on the hills?

Nothing is certain but that something lasts
untold, unknown – and manically alive
behind the stillness. A crashing waterfall
out of the sky of the past transforms and drenches
a hardy fieldfolk, singing in bursts of sun,
slapping their sides with laughter in the rain . . .

Visitor to this field, stand quiet, stand on
and listen in, for you may find yourself
present, if at a distance, at a discussion
of life itself. And there may come a moment
to be accepted into a circle of friends . . .