Caerwenfor

Close to the house with the grass roof

on the Ceredigion coast

there is a burial mound.

Here inside, we too are buried

beneath the wind-stroked, windswept grass.

Below the grass, the glass

of four wide windows

reveals - and revels in - the seen

and sometimes unseen sea,

six hundred feet below:

lapping, washing, whipping

the foot of this sea hill so steeply sloping

down brown-green bracken,

green and golden gorse,

and brown or green or sometimes purple heather.

It is land so long untrodden

apart from posts precisely placed

to fix and fence the flocks

that once would wander here,

fearless of falling –

unlike their shepherds, with their dogs,

who remain forever fearful.

But now there is a surer way

athwart this fearful land:

a path - with purpose, and for pleasure,

constructed with glad craftsmanship,

plundering the coastal views

of sea, and sky and ground

for storing in the mind

or – likelier – for capturing on camera:

creating a true treasure trove

to be unearthed in years to come, and one day found,

in a very different kind of burial mound.

 October 2013