ST CUTHBERT'S WAY - POEMS (130)

This is just a trial verse to say

That this meter is enough

To support the cut and thrust

Of a longer poem on our way.

1

Caedmon sang his hymn to Praise

Creation, in St Cuthbert's days,

So I too must find new ways

Along the Pilgrim Path

To meditate upon a world

Where rolling hills and rivers curled

About bright ruins are unfurled

Along the Pilgrim Path

As from Melrose on to Holy Isle

We walk each vale and climb each style

Day by day and mile by mile

Along the Pilgrim Path

Until we come with staff in hand

Across the tidal flooded strand

Up to that gentle Holy Land

Along the Pilgrim Path

And there with eighty miles now done

We'll celebrate a victory won

Giving thanks to God, the Three in One

Along the Pilgrim Path.

2

Going to Jerusalem was seen

As the pinnacle of faith

The laurel for the victor's race

For those who lived the medieval dream.

And even if you couldn't go abroad

A British Pilrimage of Grace

To a somewhat closer place

Was fine, if that was all you could afford.

And as for us the Holy Land's unsafe

What better for Pilgrims today

Than walking in St Cuthbert's way

In search of God's tranquility and Grace.

Brian Hick late September 2011

©copyright Sally Hick 3.11.23