Friday, July 21, 2017

Path Between Two Stone Rows (Bethlehem CT)



Dropping off a small percentage of my grandchildren at Summer Camp,
I happen by the Preacher's Preserve and take a little walk.
I should tell my friend Bob that here's another spot
Where you can walk between the stone borders of an unpaved Indian Trail...
Well, a trail off of another trail
- you could use it to get somewhere
And with a little bit of mutual co-operation,
When fire maintained the trail,
A group of hunters might use it as a game drive...
How do I know these stones are of Indigenous Origin?
The assumption is that these are Estate Walls,
Built for the first Puritan Minister of the New Light,
Long maintained by farm hands on a working farm,
But if that's true, then why the snakes and turtles, 
The rhomboidals and spirit faces in these rows of stones?
The first breach in the long row (above) is near what I've assumed,
Like many others, is a foundation of some sort,
A long gone barn perhaps, but suddenly I see:
This is a Great Serpent, with a white quartz stone eye...
(I think of Matt Bua's photo:)
(I think of this one not far from here in Washington CT:)

Close up of the eye, and a healing diamond "scale..."
Zoomorphic stones abound - perhaps the face of a bear??
I looked into a niche on the opposite side,
And I have to confess:
I stared at this a long time,
Thinking I was seeing a living animal...

I finally decided that the "animal" was way too motionless,
Set the camera to take two photos,
The first with no flash: 
The second with a flash,
Prepared to jump back - just in case... 
Forelegs extended, a turtle-like face, not an uncommon pattern,
These occur elsewhere, including the foundation and other stonework around our circa 1700 home:
Turtle head in a nuchal notch: 
I wonder what the fallen stone looks like,
I wonder if it matches the one still in place... 


Perhaps, I was thinking,
What a skeptical person needs
Is a grandchild to walk with them,
To look for faces on the stones,
To spot the turtles of many sizes and shapes
In these rows of stones...











This is sort of a "new" (to me) form of turtle,
a profile with an extended neck
- and the carapace suggests "box turtle:" 





Box Turtle image lifted from:

Flickr Album "Preacher's Again:"

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