They buried warm bones and juicy flesh
deep in their soil for four thousand years
and piled upon their memories
granite boulders, quartz and clay
garnered from the scrotums
and the breasts of distant places.
Their couplings faded into death
and left us sacred places to regret or visit,
places to dispel our slipping times and ages
for memory’s imagination.
Come o holy spirit, fill the hearts of us—
breathe on us immortality.
Once I stole a stone
from such a sacred place.
And when I hold it to my lips
I taste within its momentary chill
the warm eclipse of history.
Some day I will go back
and surreptitiously return it
to its place in time.
Some day replace this surrogate
with my own rhyme. 
Copyright Seamus Cashman 2007
