It is oft remarked a a living dog
Is preferable to dead dead lion.
While on a battlefield this is doubtless, true
In art I cannot hold that view.
When the day has almost melted
Into cool embrace of night
It is my singular delight,
To visit the Lion's boneyard.
The ancient gates so easily yield
To a gentle well placed push,
That silent splendour, long concealed
Presently, once more revealed,
broken monuments and weathered stones
A climbing frame for vine and bush.
There upon their great, grey biers
Lie the company of countless years
Fly-flayed of flesh, bleached-white bones
In many pleasing arrangements rest.
Some sit with heads 'twixt erstwhile paws,
Still possessed of curling onyx claws
While others repose upon their side
A comfortable eternity to abide,
In undisturbed well-merited peace.
Though many more appear to writhe
With twisted spines and lolling heads
In extremis upon their marble beds,
Exposing milk-white teeth in chalcedony jaws.
The more recent ones are more complete
Though all are pleasingly free of meat,
the older ones are a mysterious jumble
Their very bones have begun to crumble.
For the elements
time's instruments,
have pleased themselves to reclaim
Their well proportioned remnants
Along with their golden manes.
For some have endured such a lengthy exposure
In this tenebrous enclosure
To the twin nurturers of playful rain and golden rays,
That lacking ribs and vertebrae
The only recognizable feature
Is the pitted skull of the stately creature
Whose hollow sockets are now entwined,
With creeping scented eglantine
Thus sweetness reclaims strength.
Alone now once again
Here in my hand the earthly remains
Of one of my gilded graceful beasts.
In closing a book with faded leaves
I close the gates of my beloved necropolis
And steal away before dawn,
lest I fall prey to the living dogs.
RM Clarkson.
