Friday 23 December 2011

The property of stones


The following poem is about the history of my own country of Wales and my own family but it is inspired, if that is the right word, by the deteriorating political situation in Hungary (see George Szirtes' blog). I offer it as encouragement and support to oppressed and subjugated peoples wherever they are.


regarding
the ancient wisdom
of the people

they knew the swim of the salmon
and the swim of the stars
and they knew the power
in the songs of the stones
as in a summer
of mysterious lights
and mysterious sights
and they could tell you
these people
why the stones
would sing
and they could tell you
these people
many another thing
before the time
of the coming
of the crazy people
with their contrary proofs
and their many damnations
as is known to happen
from time to time
and from place to place
in the world
a crazy people
who didn't believe
all the superstitious nonsense
as they called it
a crazy people with too many books
in which someone had written
that everything anyone thought they knew
must be false
and wrong
and evil
and wicked
and a stumbling stone
on the way to redemption
a crazy people come to knock
them
down
as they always had done
everywhere else
before
but somehow
this time
a
number
held hard to the faith
to the stones
and to the power of the stones
and so it was
that they grew
relentless
and stubborn

just as the stones
that grow
in the fields

gw2011/

4 comments:

  1. This is wonderful, Gwilym. Such a flow and the rightsidedness aids this giving the poem a rare shape.

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  2. Thank you Gordon. Look out for another stone coming this way soon.

    Hope it's all going well with your Martian revamp. I'm on pins.

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  3. Wow !!!! Great. I have read your all different different opinion by different person. I want to read few more article on this topic so that's why I have bookmarked it and now awaiting for your new article or post.

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  4. More about stones in a week or two.

    ReplyDelete

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