Stone Cottages Poem by David Lewis Paget

You built your stone cottages
Without any windows,
No light for your memories
No doors for your soul;
You’ve long kept your pillages
Deep-dug in foundations
Your meadows and villages
Too far from your home.

The shadows of verities
Loom large on verandahs
To strut at the terraces,
Assault your grim walls;
But all of your sureties
Are locked in your cottages
And all your serenity
In dark, airless halls.

Your lines cross your messages
In treks round old workings,
Your mind lines the precipice
That quickens your pride,
Your darkness is born of
Young dreams and old wreckages,
Short schemes and long yearnings
You’ve always denied.

23 May 1978