Pause For Poetry:
Michael Hawkes /30

Stone-Age Stones

A poem by Michael Hawkes

Amidst animal. Vegetable and mineral,
When mountain peaks were thrones,
Where bodies, ‘though ephemeral
Were not mere flesh and bones,
Man elevated ancestors
On piles of lesser stones.

Thus temples were erected
In memory of the dead
Where gem-stones were rejected,
All ornament neglected,
Where rough hewn rocks connected
To the basalt overhead.

Such monumental structures stand,
Some capstones still in place,
As sentinels across the land,
As guardians of time and space
That one fine day a future race
May come to understand.

Far off in the mists of time,
As the universe expands,
Beyond the end of man’s decline,
With Gaia yet in firm command,
These ancestors of yours and mine
Will be blown dust and dunes of sand.

28/7/21 –  Hawkes

Feature image: garethwiscombe, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia CommonsOther poetry, essays and short stories
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