Rock of Ages, Cleft for me,
Let me Hide my Self in thee²
Pulse of Stone: Mineral Arteries³
We are forced to appear before a
Miner – and take the form of a Stone⁴
To each Stone ask: “How-do-you-do?”
Stone Answers back: “Well! And you?”⁵
Not a Stone but cries behind us, every weary step,
“Where, Where?” I leave Stones to reply to Stones⁶
Rocks have their Dreams – and the Earth Changes⁷
Art thou Obdurate, Flinty, Hard as Steel – nay,
More than flint, for Stone at rain Relenteth⁸
Poetry is a language for the Stone when
It sits Naked under its own Name and
Is hurled by the Wind over the Slope⁹
Every Stone one lifts by Day –
Becomes one’s Heart by Night¹⁰
¹ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King
² Wendell Berry, At a Country Funeral
³ Denise Levertov, Lovers (I)
⁴ Paulo Coelho tr. Alan R. Clarke, The Alchemist
⁵ Langston Hughes, Heaven
⁶ Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Aurora Leigh
⁷ Ursula K. Le Guin, The Lathe of Heaven
⁸ William Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis
⁹ Khairi Mansour tr. May Jayyusi & Jeremy Reed, Poetry
¹⁰ Oscar Wilde, The Ballad of Reading Gaol