I still see them –
the sculptors of Kilpeck
on the road
to Santiago de Compostela,
crossing the Roman bridge
in the small hours

westward,
always westward,
Finisterre referring
its azure,
the jubilation of wolves
spilling into the cloister.

But some
never made it back
through the wilderness
to chisel
a sleeping Christ
from the living tree

and lie fallow
under their larch ceiling
as if amazed
by the irrepressible light
at the burial of the stars.