Skylarks at Minions

I can drive to Minions in my dreams.

You go through Rilla Mill and Upton Cross
and on upwards to the edge of the moor
where the wind is clean,
blowing hard from cold seas and empty moorland.

Leaving the car, you follow sheep tracks and small paths,
clambering over randomly strewn granite chunks.

Here is the great quarry face at the edge of the hill
and beyond, to the furthest horizon,
the landscape of Cornwall.

From a distance the stone tiers seem precarious
but it is a misleading impression,
at close quarters their permanence is unmistakable.

I have walked these paths all my life:
as a child,
with my children
and now without my children.

At the top of the hill,
where the view is unchanging,
I felt that it could be any or none of those times.

On the way back we lay in the tussocky grass
and, turning our faces to the sky,
let the molten sound of the skylarks pour over us.

In all the times that I have been to Minions
I have never stopped to listen to the skylarks.

There are always new things to discover.
I know that now.