High banked, single tracked
Ways cut deep by aeons of steps,
Rutted by planked wheels
Or the constancy of hooves
Crossing the ridge-lines
To market or fair.

Winding, uphill, overtopped
By beech and oak,
Maple and hawthorn,
Rough slabs of dirty, bedded chalk
And mossy stalactites
Where water scarpers…
Leaving a shadowed bed
Of leaves and tilth.

Dappled paths, millennia old,
Connect today with yesterday –
The drover with the rambler,
The herdsman with the hiker,
Tracing or retracing
Paths through time.