West Kennet Long Barrow. Image credit Willow

The Megaliths

Heedless, unheeded of the years they stand;
The rain drips off their chins and lichens spread
A moist green skin along each stony hand
That gropes among the bones of the grey dead.

They did not see the forests flow and fall -
Junipers blue wave by the fellside shore -
Nor barley batten by the coddling wall,
Nor purple ploughland swipe across the moor.

They hold death in them. Skulls have moulded ears
That deaf remain to curlew, crow and dove.
The human winds blow past them; each one fears
The hoarded ache of malignant love.

Norman Nicholson (1914-1987)