Such a storm is brewing
That will shake the faith of priests,
Move mountains, leave
Devastation’s awe behind.
See the unholy bruise-glow pressure
Build over the Marches, the
Shark bellied cloud roil and
Press on new-leaved oaks.
Such a tempest will first be hot, dry,
Then by degree cold and soul-deep damp;
Whose winds will lift thatch, the wings of ravens
That perch on funeral long-ship sails.
There will be crackle-snake lightnings
That lick the belladonna crevasses of nimbus,
Bend the prayers of fearful mortals and
resound down the throats of
All the Hells that have ever been.
Such gales that will shift landmarks, so that
New dawn locals stupefied and stunned by the clamour
And new landscape will be witless:
“Where is the henge?”
“Where the mill?”
Roads will be sundered,
Valleys filled with split rocks and earth
As the very hills seek to fill up the cave – ears.
Nothing will be as it was;
Points will have been made,
The unworthy reduced to gibbering wrecks
(Aren’t we all, anyway,
Just the fifty shades of clay?)
Those that stand staunch, resolute,
Through what is approaching, as if
From the deranged cells of
Twisted-by-jealousy Heracles’ mind
Will deserve their places
On the pantheon.
I checked the weather, I’m not keen on soul-deep damp.