Arundel Stone

ARUNDEL STONE. AN EXPLORATION. PART 3

A range of patterns, a wealth of stone.

Bath Stone walls transform to limestone,

metamorphose to flint.

St Henry stands aloft in his nook

as a nearby dragon bays at the moon.

Limestone here is granular, oolitic –

fragments of shells in a tropical sea

washed by tides and covered in calcite

through many thousands of years.

We end in River Road – quiet today

with memories of shipping and trade.

Stone walls and broken buildings

have their own tales to tell.

Smells of chalk, smells of the river.

Glimpses of the past touch me

like light through small leaves.

ARUNDEL STONE. AN EXPLORATION IN VERSE. PART 2

Stone in Arundel Castle

hums with vibrations of its past –

a proud defender of river and land

it suffered a poisoned well for the Royalists

and onslaughts from Cromwell's force.

St Wilfrid, says Bede,

brought men of Sussex to a Christian faith

by teaching them to fish.

An ancient Priory solid in flint

bears his name. Here masses were sung

for benefactors’souls.

St Nicholas

would love the church that’s his.

Window arches in ivy and stone

fill up,overflow with light.

A gargoyle glares and spits

rain down from the roof.

Gravestone dates tell sad tales,

sink beneath the roots.

Stone Walk around Arundel. Part 1

A STONE WALK AROUND ARUNDEL   AN EXPLORATION IN VERSE   PART 1

We begin with firm feet

on hard pink granite – French and resistant
to hooves and to dung in days when this square
was a bedlam of selling
and the heavy moaning of beasts.

 Graven names on the war memorial

are concise in afternoon sun.

Up the hill by the castle walls
fossils like seeds are pitted in slabs
of ancient Purbeck stone.
We crouch down, try and study them,
get looks from passers by. 

Maltravers Street is solid in flint
but sandstone pillars are weathered,
crumbled, pale.

Below the level of the street

a spooky passage leads to the cells.
Candlelit tours and mystery nights
tell of Victorian ghosts.

 High above tall windows

carvings of Lion, Swallow and Horse
stare out in heritage pride.