Newstead Abbey - Changes

Newstead Abbey Gardens: 
Changes 


In Newstead’s Abbey’s heart, where hills embrace, 
A garden blooms with whispered grace, 
Where nature twines with history’s thread 
   echoes of monks’ Gregorian chants, once said. 

Among these paths, where stillness reigns, 
A remnant of the past remains, 
Herbal beds in ordered rows, Always nurtured where devotion rose 
among the monks, in solemn, cloistered peace, 
Who sought in nature's touch a sweet release. 

Like rosaries, each leaf a prayer, each stem a hymn 
A melody of faith that grew dim. 
The yews and oaks with gnarled might 
Stood strong through Henry VIII’s ruthless fight

A mirror of Newstead Abbey's soul, now dismayed. 
The young poet lets the gardens grow untamed, 
There, where monks once walked with spirits claimed, 
Ivy crept with nature’s memory thread, 
Binding present, past, the living and the dead. 
The lakes, where waters darkly glide, 
Mirror the young Byron's stormy mind. 
Their surfaces disturbed by tumultuous winds,
Like the restless thoughts within the poems penned. 

For the traces of monks and Byron remain clear, 
Alive in spirit, though distant, yet feel so near, 
Their prayers and verses now entwined, 
In Newstead’s gardens, forever enshrined. 
Take a wander to this garden, where, for a while, 
Time.   Stands.   Still. 
Where wilderness awaits, in every bough, 
A garden where the past,    is now.

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