Highlands

What have you seen, eagle, from your windswept throne?
What lives have passed beneath, stumbing through the mud?
What faces, tired of the empty sky and open spaces, yearned for
home?
What lovers, together in the sun, sprinkled the heather with their
blood
When the moon, steel-cold and heartless, burned like fire
On the blades of enemies, and lit their faces a ghostly white
When limbs thrashed in dark water and their funeral pyre
Was only the cold beat of rain, the frosty chill of winter's
night?
What ships sailed off your fog-bound coast
Tanned, alien faces straining in the mirk for sight of land?
What laughter, which tales pleased you most?
How many dreams ebbed with the tide on the drowning sand?
Only you remain, and the cloud-covered stone
And the moss-eaten ruins, barren and bleached like bone.