The stones are great

And magic power they have

Men that are sick

Fare to that stone

And they wash that stone

And with that water bathe away their sickness

Laymond

Indeed the stones are great, and certainly have had the power to capture the imagination of poets and artists down through the centuries. When I first started collecting poems on the megalithic theme, a colleague warned that I'd be hard pressed to find even half a dozen on the structures and prehistoric sites of Britain, Ireland and the European continent. Since then Megalithic Poems has grown out of all expectations, and there are now several hundred poems here, and an equal number of drawings, paintings, prints or photographs to accompany them - perhaps the largest anthology of its kind anywhere.

The poems stretch over a period of some eight hundred years; from Laymon's poem Brut (above) of 1215 describing Stonehenge, to poems written only a few months ago. What does this tell us? Well, perhaps that not only have these structures inspired poets like Blake and Wordsworth (as well as artists such as Constable and Turner) down through the ages but also that this marvellous, mysterious megalithic heritage of ours continues to inspire us even today.

At a time when so much of our heritage is at risk through development and mismanagement (Tara in Ireland for example, even Stonehenge and Avebury) perhaps these poems, and the images that accompany them, will continue to inspire those who would take time out from busy lives to visit and ponder upon this often overlooked aspect of our heritage. Not only that, hopefully this anthology will also act as a warning that these places, built by our forefathers millennia ago, are in constant need of our care and attention lest, after thousands of years having, "...brav'd the continual assaults of weather..." (William Stukeley) they are finally lost for all time through the greed, ignorance and insensitivity of the 21st century.

I hope that the poems and images on the megalithic theme found on these pages will become a useful resource for those interested in the poetry, art and the history of our megalithic past - none of which would appear here without the remarkable efforts and creativity of those who have written about megaliths or portrayed them in their work - not forgetting of course those who originally conceived and built these amazing structures! To everyone, a very big thank you. I hope you'll find as much pleasure browsing through the anthology as I've taken in compiling it.

Littlestone

Index of poems, poets, pictures and places.

The Megalithic Poems internal search engine is on the right of the page under Links. Once you've keyed in a search word the relevant information will appear under the Gideon Fidler Stonehenge image above.

Standing Stone in Dyfed (detail) by John Piper

In their lichened, faceted faces

In their lichened,

faceted faces we see our lineaments; in their

solitariness, our loneliness, or our need to be

alone; in their gregariousness, our

congregational temper; in their alignment,

our deviousness; in their poised mass, our

fragility; in their rootedness, our

deracination; in their age, our ephemerality;

and in their naked outfacing of time and the

elements, a valuable lesson in patient dissent.


Jan Morris

Mount Silbury by Richard Colt Hoare (1758-1838)

Silbury Hill

O Thou, to whom in the olden times was raised
Yon ample Mound, not fashion'd to display
An artful structure, but with better skill
Piled massive, to endure through many an age,
How simple, how majestic is thy tomb!
When temples and when palaces shall fall,
And mighty cities moulder into dust,
When to their deep foundations Time shall shake
The strong-based pyramids, shall thine remain
Amid the general ruin unsubdued,
Uninjured as the everlasting hills,
And mock the feeble power of storms and Time.

William Crowe (1745-1829)

Punkri Burwadih megaliths in the monsoon. Image credit Subhashis Das

THE MESSENGER

Fly bird fly, through the timeless skies
transcending distances,
flipping back the illegible pages of history
fly bird fly.

Beyond the peripheries of the East India Company,
surpassing the magnanimous Mughal palaces,
the ruins of the Slave Dynasty,
the graceful Chola temples
fly bird fly. Pass over
the time of the establishment of the sacred Dhamas
of the revered Shankracharya,
beyond the theorems and the doctrines of
Varahamihira and Aryabhatta.
Fly over the deserted forts of the Munda kings and
through the courts of Vikramaditya, Ashoka and Ajatshatru.
Bird o bird
Touch respectfully the lotus feet of the
Sakya Muni and Vardhamana
and seek their blessings for me.

Fly bird fly
Crossing Magadha, Vaishali and Sasanbeda
onto the much beyond Harappa and Mehergarh.
Be a part of the great Santhal migration.
Little bird
fly past carefully protecting yourself
from the rising flames
of the iron smelting Asuras
and then plunge into the great unknown, when
the world was for the Great Mother and She for the world.
Arrive face to face with their
astronomy, mathematics and spiritualism.

When they raise their tall monuments,
Sit atop a nearby tree in Punkri Burwadih
and witness the timeless megalith in its making.

Fly back to me little bird, the enormous distances
fluttering your untiring tiny wings.
Bring me
your acquired wisdom of life.
I await, dear bird
your arrival.

Subhashis Das

Subhashis Das has written extensively on the megaliths of India – his website on the subject is here.

Avebury, north-east quadrant

Avebury

A cold New Year’s Eve seeps in,
Walking along an unknown path,
Confronted suddenly by giant arcs of ditch and bank
Which draw the eye towards processions of stones.
Rings within rings,
Gauntly chiselled jewels bound by bracelets of mossy grass,
Their ancient faces careworn from witnessing millennia -
Sad, yet proud and wise, these forty ton leviathans.
Echoes of long-forgotten rituals
Intangible yet close, a sense of collective aim.
Slowly we traverse the great circle,
Latter-day invaders, unsure of their purpose.
How much have we forgotten?
Over two hundred generations - what is remembered?

Geoff Butts

So proud to hint

Pile of Stone-henge! So proud to hint yet keep
Thy secrets, thou lov'st to stand and hear
The plain resounding to the whirlwind's sweep
Inmate of lonesome Nature's endless year.

William Wordsworth

Adam's Grave, Wiltshire. Image credit Gordon Kingston

Their presence

‘Neath Adam’s Grave I push “large chips”
down through my teeth and grasping lips...

Didn’t Strabo state that ancients ate
Their fathers’ bodies on a plate;
And drank the fluid that now gets hid
In a silver cup, under a silver lid?
Somehow their presence is up here still;
Watching me watching, on the hill.

Gordon Kingston

It runs like a green ribbon

Richard Jefferies was a novelist, naturalist and a mystic; he grew up in a house (now the Richard Jefferies Museum) close to Coate Water on the outskirts of Swindon. In his book, Wildlife in a Southern County, published in 1879, Jefferies writes of the Ridgeway -

A broad green track runs for many a long, long mile across the downs, now following the ridges, now winding past at the foot of a grassy slope, then stretching away through a cornfield and fallow. It is distinct from the wagon-tracks which cross it here and there, for these are local only, and, if traced up, land the wayfarer presently in a maze of fields, or end abruptly in the rickyard of a lone farmhouse. It is distinct from the hard roads of modern construction which also at wide intervals cross its course, dusty and glaringly white in the sunshine... With varying width, from twenty to fifty yards, it runs like a green ribbon... a width that allows a flock of sheep to travel easily side by side.

Richard Jefferies (1848-1887)

Section of the Ridgeway near Wayland's Smithy. Image credit Moss

The Cerne Abbas, or Dorset, Giant

Image credit LordHarris. Wikipedia Commons

The Cerne Abbas giant is, "...on a hillside near the village of Cerne Abbas, to the north of Dorchester, in Dorset, England. The 180 ft (55 m) high, 167 ft (51 m) wide figure is carved into the side of a steep hill, and is best viewed from the opposite side of the valley or from the air. The carving is formed by a trench 12 in (30 cm) wide, and about the same depth, which has been cut through grass and earth into the underlying chalk. In his right hand the giant holds a knobbled club 120 ft (37 m) in length. A 1996 study found that some features of the image have changed over time; notably, the study concluded that the figure originally held a cloak in its left arm and stood over a disembodied head.

"The figure's origin and age is unknown. Early antiquarians associated it with a Saxon deity, though there is little evidence for such a connection. Other scholars sought to identify it with a Celtic British figure or the Roman Heracles, or some syncretization of the two. The 1996 discoveries strengthened the identification with Heracles, who was often depicted wielding a club and carrying a cloak made from the Nemean Lion. However, since the first descriptions of the figure do not appear until the mid-18th century, many scholars conclude that it is not significantly older than that. Regardless of its age, the Cerne Abbas giant has become an important part of local culture and folklore, which often associates it with fertility."

Source Wikipiedia

The counties

But I want to write to an Essex girl,

greeting her warmly.

But I want to write to a Shropshire lad,

brave boy, home from the army,

and I want to write to the Lincolnshire Poacher

to hear of his hare

and to an aunt in Bedfordshire

who makes a wooden hill of her stair.

But I want to post a rose to a Lancashire lass,

red, I'll pick it,

and I want to write to a Middlesex mate

for tickets for cricket.

But I want to write to the Ayrshire cheesemaker

and his good cow

and it is my duty to write to the Queen at Berkshire

in praise of Slough.

But I want to write to the National Poet of Wales at Ceredigion

in celebration

and I want to write to the Dorset Giant

in admiration

and I want to write to a widow in Rutland

in commiseration

and to the Inland Revenue in Yorkshire

in desperation.

But I want to write to my uncle in Clackmannanshire

in his kilt

and to my scrumptious cousin in Somerset

with her cidery lilt.

But I want to write to two ladies in Denbighshire,

near Llangollen

and I want to write to a laddie in Lanarkshire,

Dear Lachlan …

But I want to write to the Cheshire Cat,

returning its smile.

But I want to write the names of the Counties down

for my own child

and may they never be lost to her …

all the birds of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire...



Carol Ann Duffy

Bodowyr, looking eastwards to Snowdonia. Image credit Gordon Kingston

Like the strands of an ancient beard

Not a poem, but a lovely piece of prose. The rest is here -

http://heritageaction.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/focus-on-bodowyr-anglesey/

...the quartz hangs in droplets on the stones, like the drizzled water on the rails outside - the capstone itself, supported by three (of an original four) uprights, has the scaled contours of a peak in the massive mountain range that the chamber opens towards. Inside, on the surfaces to the rear of that eastern opening, but more ephemerally, suitably perhaps, sheep wool trails white and wispy, like the strands of an ancient beard.

Gordon Kingston

Castlerigg by T Allom & H Alard. circa 1835

Although very fine things

Although very fine things,
I think some great giant was playing at ninepins,---
And leaving the place, ere his ball he could swing,
Has left all his ninepins stuck up in a ring!

John Ruskin (1819-1900)