Notes on Lunchtime Lecture – The Poem is not on the website.
The lecture was in a Museum, given by an archaeologist. The subject, the discovery of the bones of a young Stone Age woman unearthed by a farmer digging for stone. The archaeologist held up the skull as he talked. It was beautiful, inspiring reverence, not horror. There are similes and metaphors to describe the skull, the action of the tractor/digger, and the ‘stare’ of the ‘crowd of light’ after thousands of years of darkness. Verse three describes the skull, and compares and contrasts the long-dead woman with myself, alive.