The stone which Pip Hall is going to vandalise

After enquiries with Natural England about this stupid affair, they sent me photos of the stone in question that Pip Hall intends to vandalise, paid for & encouraged by Rachel Feldberg, Tom Lonsdale and Simon Armitage in their 'Stanza Stones' project. It is located at grid-reference SE 12549 46814, just below the 'FB' (footbridge) at the centre of the map, nearly 250 yards by foot up Backstone Beck from where the stream meets the roadside.

Here's some others Natural England sent through, one of which has the lovely Simon Armitage stroking the stone they intend to vandalise -

If you want to find to this stone, from Ilkley go up Cowpasture Road and just where the road bends to the left (100 yards above the mini-roundabout), just before the cattle-grid in the road, you’ll notice a tree-lined rocky valley running up onto the moors on your right-hand side. Walk up the valley for about 175 yards (it’ll feel a bit longer than that though!), where you’ll meet with a wooden bridge. There’s a small path running up above the western side of the stream, for about 50 yards, then drop down to the stream itself and look up another 20 yards ahead of you. Here's an aerial image of the stone Tom Lonsdale, Rachel Feldberg and their Stanza Stones project intend to vandalise, about 4mm below the pin-head:

How very sad.
I would have thought better from Simon Armitage than this.
I bet Ted Hughes will be spinning in his grave.

I'm gonna carve a poem on the rock next to it, it goes ......

There was an old pros of Azores,
Who's fanny was all covered with sores.
When she walked down the street
The dogs sniffed the green meat
That hung in festoons from her drawers.

Wadya think, I'm good with steel tools, who could complain?
Rodaxe the ringfinder

rodjack wrote:I'm gonna carve a poem on the rock next to it, it goes ......There was an old pros of Azores who's fanny was all covered with sores. When she walked down the street the dogs sniffed the green meat that hung in festoons from her drawers.
Wadya think, I'm good with steel tools, who could complain?

That could be a good idea Rod... You could carve it on the same stone, so you didn't get into trouble. I don't suppose it'd matter, would it? In fact, mebbe we could shift the emphasis a bit, and simply carve our own stuff on top of Pip Hall's vandalism. People could carve cartoon tits, 'LUFC' (hundreds o' thousands of people would support that!), or whatever they wanted onto the vandalised stone. Contact Rachel Feldberg and Ton Lonsdale and see how much they'd pay you.

I reckon we should vote on whether your poem, or Simon Armitage's should get greater prominence on the rock. It's a struggle, but...yeah, after reading them again, your poem gets my vote Rod! 1-0 to you!