By Miners Hands Poem by David Lewis Paget

What miner’s art
Did meld and make,
Did stone on stone
Fling you on high,
Or lie beneath
The stars, awake
To think your shape
As nights sped by?

What weary hand
Did knead and tread
Your mud in some
Dead winter’s storm,
While autumn’s bride
Long kept her bed
To wait his will
Who gave you form.

And though they lie
Unknown at last,
Without foundation
Still you stand,
Your walls have stood
Six score of years
While they ran through
Their shift of sand!

And every furrow
At some brow
Did trace in mud
These barren lands,
Each humble cottage
Built in need
Was raised in pride
By miner’s hands!

18 February 1983