"would Druids come to us"

Would Druids come to us
they would have aches
about the loins, about the heart.
"Build us a Stonehenge here,
a dolmen circle for the sun,"
would say a priest.
Mack trucks would come,
would bring the boulders to the public square
hard-hats would hoist them, one by one,
children would blink, would stand and stare
and grownups pass them by, obliviously,
mind bent on meat-press or the cutting board.
The circle set, the stones erect,
High priest would stand one solstice night,
not move a muscle in his twelve hour watch,
would wait the knife cut first sun ray
burn laser sharp through rock, to eye, to mind,
would see, through mists, a whorling vault,
an oak stump throne in thunder clouds,
burled, knotted with imperial glues
and massive roots to rest the glorious feet.
Over the throne would float a cloud
much darker, and more pregnant than the rest,
Withholding lightning barely for awhile
until the oak would take its regal guest,
(The eagle dips. The mistletoe,
;the swamp-reeds shiver.
The fisher darts, a loon will cry;
A cold wind sweeps the river.)

The oak stump stands. The Druids wait;
and lightning cracks through streaming clouds.
The wet begins to drizzle.
The hard-hats gone, the crowds pass on,
The priest waits like a heron;
His fellow saints are inward strung
as arrows in a bow.
Their forty wills are fused to bring
the sovereign to his throne.

A sparrow flies from night to night
The ice wind chills the bone.
The stump-roots knotted marvelous,
the rain now makes them shine,
The stump awaits the precious weight;
the earth is stopped in time,

The moment now is surely here
The priests stand rigid, stiff–
–and then the c1ouds pass by

The sky reflects a gentling light
The steaming stump will dry
Some foolish boulders block the way
that busy people go.
Some muttering folk incant a prayer with
ache in loin and heart.

The Druids pass, forever gone
and gray rocks mark the place
the sun is up, the day is here,
a cold wind stings the face.