"Northman" by Keith Harvey

Northman

From the north he flew
and sat still on silent stone,
reading the sky from right to left
until rain runs into the navel below:
green grass,
scree and geodes,
a menhir shifting toward the south
rubbed raw by the weather;
sheep graze among the crystals,
outcroppings spot the scene.
He sits
and sits,
and stares,
and waits,
his hair falling on his shoulders,
his beard spliced with gray
in its redness, dreaming.
His almond eyes green,
hidden, note his past,
until a cuckoo sounds
and the sun breaks
through bluing clouds,
melting the wax of his wings
and awakening him to gold.