Jeff Vinter
Cleeve Abbey
The walls of hand-hewn stone where plaster fell
gave up the secrets of their masons' care
some centuries ago. The office bell
that measured out the daily round of prayer
has fallen too, and now the camera's whir
enunciates this relic's modern rite,
the vision of its saints a myth-like blur
of something half-perceived in fading light.
It was not always so. The country wife
who worked the farmhouse range believed in God
and, in familiar faith, did not view life
as His poor finite gift, nor thought it odd
to see the cattle cross the cloister garth
from mullioned arcade windows by the hearth.
The Cistercian foundation Cleeve Abbey, used as a farm after the Dissolution under Henry VIII, is now in the care of English Heritage.
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