Stokesay Castle

It’s easy to romanticise the past
And idolise some English idyll where
We clean forget the alleys full of filth
Or country hovels, flea-infested, bare

Or hungry months in which our fathers starved
And sickness stalked the crowded street. And yet
To sweep away all that the years have left
Untouched is also really to forget –

We need these quiet, secluded spots
Which tell in ancient stone and weathered oak,
Not of some sweet sanitised golden age
But of the rise and fall of moneyed folk,

Who prospered briefly, built up title, rank
And power then through the centuries declined
To leave behind this crumbling, dark outline
Which stands today to educate, remind.

And thus we stand beneath the great hall’s beams
Still slightly charred by a long-extinguished blaze
And watch the iridescent swallows flit
Through window-frames which once held precious glaze,

But as we marvel at their speed, their poise,
Their grace we cannot help reflect how one day
The autumn breeze will bear them all away
And just this time-worn ruin will remain.

May 26