Seven poems written by Yorkshire poet, Simon Armitage will be engraved on stones between Marsden and Ilkley in the Yorkshire Dales, allowing walkers to stumble upon his words as they explore the landscape. All seven poems focus on different forms of water and its effect on nature, exploring snow, dew, rivers and rain.
Talking about the project Armitage writes: "I’ve spent several days in the hills now between Marsden where I was born and Ilkely, home of the Ilkley Literature Festival and host to the Stanza Stones project, and with Tom Lonsdale, the project’s Landscape Architecture consultant, have identified most of the sites where the poems might stand. We’ve driven, hiked and biked around the landscape, and still have some exploring left to do. Some of the poems will be carved onto existing outcrops, others onto introduced stones. We also made a visit to Marshalls in Elland who we hope to work with on the project. They’re a long-established Yorkshire company who quarry and cut stone. At one of their depots, I watched with an open mouth as letters and intricate designs were incised into marble and granite with nothing more than a jet of water."