Stone

The wall around Dad’s house is pale and crumbling stone.

Once on a visit I found out

he was having it rebuilt, and behind the house

sat a pile of abandoned rocks, large and small

that he was selling off, a ton at a time.

 

At the back of the garden near the old shed

he had placed one big stone, a giant he’d found,

I don’t remember where, that stood four feet tall.

He’d buried its base so it held upright,

looking like a monument, old and primal.

 

Joking about, I suggested painting it

and he said no, you can’t do that… and I saw in his face

even joking about it went against the satisfaction

it gave him – an old stone standing in the ground,

ageless and unnamed, set up for its own sake.