So here we stand in the dim lit, cold damp dawning
A group of people huddled by a stone
Reeling in the year’s ancestral mornings
When early traffic begins its rush of day
Beyond the hedge that once just wasn’t there
When Knightlow Cross watched over the way
From its hilltop across the land to Rugby
Coventry & beyond.
Our ceremony is a celebration of the time
This the hour, this the day that it must be done
As it has been been for a thousand years or more
So many turnings of the silver sun
That wroth must be paid on the Eve of Martinmas
By good folk of the lands here all about
But let us also celebrate the ancient place
Where we gather.
A point of vantage, judgment, preaching & burial
From which the crow can fly
The mind’s eye given freedom mile over mile
To review the land of Albion below;
Our sea wave girdled island
The shore dressed by cliffs, high & low
Shingle, sand, mud & salty marsh
Where Winter’s bird flocks gather.
North we fly! Over Coombe & Hinckley
Coalville & the Trent; Steely Sheffield & Wetherby
To the tumbled rocky cliffs of my youth
Between Shields & Sunderland
Where we meet the Great North Sea;
Or South over Princethorpe, Southam,
Wantage & the chalk hills of the Hampshire Downs
To Southampton, the Solent & the Isle of Wight.
Our flight can take us West over Lickey Hills
Stourport, Ludlow & the Cambrian Mountains
To Cardigan Bay & the Irish Sea;
& East! Past Rugby, Butterfield’s Town,
Aerials, the M1, the Grand Union Canal,
Over low flat lands to follow the Ouse
From Huntingdon, thence to a place called Sizewell
Which you may have heard of(!)
If we stand for just a moment’s contemplation
All those places seem to draw nearby
Over Winter’s fields as England begins to awaken
& if we can sense their presence on this day
As we attend our ancient rite
We can know that in some mystical way
We gather for the good of all; that all the land
Revolves about this centre once a year.
Wroth Silver is an ancient ceremony for which I have the honour of being poet laureate. It takes place before dawn at the site of Knightlow Cross by the A45 in Warwickshire. http://www.wrothsilver.org.uk/
This year I sought permission to visit the Knightlow Cross field in Summer, in day time. (Actually you don't need to; a public footpath runs nearby & walkers often visit the stone which now has a little plaque explaining its significance.)
I went in July & it turned out to be the hottest day of the year! It was very interesting to see the site in daylight & enjoy the various views it affords across the land. This inspired me to make the focus of my 3rd Wroth Silver poem the place itself & its location in the landscape. The crow-flight journeys were worked out by drawing lines N, S, E & W across the country from that point. This is always an interesting exercise in itself anyway. I sat on the stone & played my small pipes.
My previous Wroth Silver poems & some explanation of the ceremony may be found as blog entries for November 2014 & 2015:
http://www.redsandstonehill.net/2014/11/martinmas.html
http://www.redsandstonehill.net/2015/11/wroth-silver-2015-road-of-time.html