The Vandals

It was scratched onto stone
rough strokes
in opposition
to the colour-cast nature had
wrought on the fine white
marble surface -

Tourist from the park, wandering
amongs the local stones
looking at all the faux flowers
and the black and gold -

probably didn't understand
the language
of moss, lichen, Highland
air - in this particular
place - casting its red breath
over stones and signs ...

interpreted it as
'lack of care'

then inscribed, stone-in-
hand - rudimentary vertical
and horizontal slashes, scored
front and back multiple times

defaced my love with
outrage
as if time and weather
had inscribed a lack
that their strange
dictionary did not
understand

lost in translation their
hands defaced all
I love
and Christ's symbol
in this damp northern
shore, scored, harsh,
is lost here ubiquitous 
among ferns, bracken, pine,
overgrown gardens
and discarded dreams.

I am so angry
I would efface them
all the sordid, bankrupt,
rotten towns and their midden
streets -

love is always lost in time
and a name on degraded
assaulted stone only happens
to the lucky ones -
we are all the unknown
bones

that the turning, ancient earth weeps for
alone
because we are no-one
and we all die
with memory
when the day is done
and time effaces all

as if we had never been
even stone succumbs -
in the end -
to grains of sand.

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