Amongst mounds of stones and sand at the foot
Of crumbling cliffs, where Norfolk juts its chin,
Stubborn and defiant as King Canute
Watching the waves roll out and crash back in
On flat landscape from Yarmouth to King’s Lynn,
A rich treasury of ancient fossils,
Cached by glaciers in the primeval
Landscape almost a million years ago,
Was finally exposed by North Sea storms:
A megafauna’s gargantuan bones
That over centuries were washed and worn,
Bared and bleached on a lonely wind-swept beach,
Buoyed by a lullaby of waves and gulls,
A male Steppe Mammoth with an ancient soul.
© Kim M. Russell, 2016
Image found on http://www.west-runton.ukfossils.co.uk
My response to imaginary garden with real toads FASHION ME YOUR WORDS ~ TO A MEGAFAUNA, where we are writing a poem in no more than 100 words about any megafauna of our choice, living or extinct. I have chosen to rewrite a cleave poem I posted on 1st April about the West Runton Mammoth that died approx. 700,000 years ago and was discovered and excavated between 1990 and 1995. It is now on display in Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery.
This flows so wonderful, and I do love the sense of what those old bones can tell us today… mammoths seems so close in time, and would have met with humans once…
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Did you notice the transformation from the cleave poem I shared on dVerse Poets Pub in April?
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I like the myth-like atmosphere you created. The ocean, the cliffs the mammoth – they’re all larger than life.
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Thanks for reading, Rommy!
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Oh what a awesome, dramatic rendering of this unearthed find. Thanks for your response
much love…
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Thanks and love, Gillena!
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Wow, elephants way back then. This is amazing! Thank you!
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Thank you for reading, Sherry!
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A male Steppe Mammoth with an ancient soul… now that is the way to end this poem. Wonderful
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Thanks for reading and commenting. I’m planning on visiting that old mammoth’s bones soon – I haven’t been to Norwich Castle for ages.
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