We

Through the dark forest,

on the unbeaten paths,

evading dryads and hamadryads,

we follow the scent,

the sent behind the prey,

we pray to pagan gods, 

tree-bound, imprisoned in the ligneous.

We paint ourselves:

woad betide invaders.

We sing the song of blood,

dance to the discordant music of time.

We know The Green Man;

Jack in the Green dances, too,

in the corner of our eyes

between the gnarled boles

of oak, ash, beech and sycamore.

There are newer gods, at odds

with nature, ourselves and Britannia

- home of Picts, Scots, Celts and fools.

Rules may confine us though we are free

- no Roman, Saxon, Dane or Norman will

spill our blood in rivers renamed in other tongues.

We were Britons, we were Britannia,

we remain in verse, abstruse and difficult,

in faded, bloodied parchment

and scarcely discernible runes.