An alternative version of _Heaven Waits the Rubble Mason_ first published in
Stone Industry News Update, 1993. I'm not always consistent in my versions of
poetry, and am continually revising. While I was in Poland _Heaven Waits the
Rubble Mason_ was translated by Dr. Tomasz Dutkiewicz into Polish. The English
and Polish versions are now displayed on our exterior bulletin board on the
front of the Apple shop. Tomasz also gave me a copy of one of his poems to
translate from Polish to english.

FOREVER KEYSTONE HUNTER

This rubble mason may die at his bancum
blinking chips punched to the face,
yet his mash hammer will continue to strike
braced, thick thighs with wedged stone,
fish scales to tail
in a white plastic bucket.

In the stoneyard of heaven
Marshall dreams mosaic visions.
Blunt, a golden trowel skips stiff mud,
before the firebrick firebox,
beyond a damper-darkened smoke chamber,
beneath fruitwood smoke, chimney wash,
and oak's red leaf on a chill day,
following another black coffee,
grunts of lifted stone humped upon stone.

Thick arms in full motion sweat everlasting
to reach an apex against bold light --
rush down with a slight twist to pop.
Cackle of guinea hens echoes the sledge blast
striking an earth-stained grain.
Stone, their cold touch to him explodes
color hidden within split shells.

A gallon pitcher of hard autumn cider
on the fresh crabapple hearth
toasting to the small fire, ritual
fertility of the first flame.

A flat arch spans the opening
where family emerges to ring the breast.
Sons, daughters, siblings of stone,
here is the mother in this fossil moon.
Staggering and pointing, Marshall reveals
an image of our father in this iron boulder,
an elder son of a fine blood sandstone,
with keystone left to last, of an azure blue.

copyright © Ken Follett 1997