Poetry
Here is the Book

Here is the Book

Posted by Tim Lenton on 4 January 2009 at 18:07

Here on the edge of a drowned world
land of the True Cross
we walk on the moon, dark side,
among marbled pillars
touching unearthly colours
dusty passages
fingering forgotten legends

Treasure buried in the priory
where foreign knights battle secretly
against skeletons
and in the Kingdom of God
near Bromholm
the dead are raised

Iron stands like spears against the sun
while stone dissolves

As in the beginning
the word breathes on
until the void takes form
becomes a sacred, fertile field

Visions of Hildegard or Agnes in the rain
play dark tricks
as the world folds into paper,
holding on

Ruins bought and sold
breathe again
words emerge from the rock:
locks are broken

Burning kingfishers perch on fallen walls:
paths burst from the undergrowth

Here on the edge of the moon
Here is the book
Here are the letters thrown down and lifted up
Here the rushing wind
fire and water
laid like a cloth of gold and silver
under the patient stars

Poet's comment: This was written for the Paston Project in 2008 and draws on many aspects of the work, especially history and the surrounding countryside – and of course the book itself.

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Here is the Book

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