The Mute Stones

Think of a long coil of white rocks
Like stones for graves, that size and shape—

Call them days. On each has been carved
Signs. You might read them. You might not.

The stones don’t read them. Stones are mute.
All the poems on moons and blooms, all

The fierce tales of beasts and what folks
Have done that was wrong, that was cruel,

That should not have been done, they say
Not one thing in the voice of stones.

Think of the stones, carved, placed, and left.
If no one reads them, no one comes

To smash them or cart them off or
Make a cult of fierce tales for them,

They will stay as long as more stones
Don’t shift or fall and knock them down,

Which is to say, a while. Days, years,
There, mute, signs and all. Days, years, stones.