Standing the test of time

OK, this is a long one, but I really like it. The subject matter is intentionally left unclear. I'm interested to hear what people think it is, so please, review it! Even if you think it's lame!

Standing the test of Time

Long we stood, thousands of us, millions;
The world around us changing and flitting by;
Heedless of us though we were in plain view;
Hidden sentinels under turbulent sky.

Then they came, biting, gnawing at us, killing;
Then I fell, a cavernous groan escaping my fellows;
Tumbling to the floor, crushing blade and flower;
Left as carrion for the circling crows.

We lay there for an eternity, through sun and rain;
None cared for us, and many were devoured there.
I waited for my time to come, the end of all time,
But it never came, and I waited under careless air.

Days became years, years became millennia,
What comes after that I do not know.
A time of darkness, silence while we were changed,
beneath the earth we dwelt, time passing slow.

Then lo! There was movement around me!
We were being harassed by a force unseen.
Many were torn away in that heaving riot of noise;
Of our fate, our destiny, we could only dream.

Heat, terrible heat as we gasped and screamed;
Hell on earth from which there was no relief.
But I escaped, one of the lucky ones;
And I tore away into the night like a thief.

Up, up, up I sailed, into the sky and the clouds;
Freedom! Adversity had been shown the door!
I was unshackled, but alone in my flight through heaven;
The ground below me, the grass a distant floor.

I was caught by a gust, the breath of God,
And swept away to pastures, places and times unknown.
Where would I land, and what would I do?
My fate, my destiny, now the seeds had been sown.

I fell into a lake, a glistening sea of cool blue,
And I dwindled on the surface, waiting to fall again.
The water took me, and down I went, sinking slowly.
For a year I fell, for two, for ten.

While I lay submerged in the cold darkness,
Millennia passed, kings rose and fell and became history;
The world above was lost to me, enigmatic,
The past, the future, all now lost in mystery.

Then again, movement! I was on the run,
Swept up by an unseen force in the gloom.
I was being carried away, suspended in water,
To face the uncertainty of my unguessable doom.

So long I spent wondering then, before I was cast aside,
The flow now bored of my questionable company.
I was there on the shore, bathed in golden light,
The river beside me giggling its timeless symphony.

Freedom again was a blade two-sided, ironic,
The whole world ahead, cut off from me.
But not overlong did I wait this time, before I was raised,
Up from the floor by the body of a strange, alien entity.

Then came another, like unto the first, yet smaller,
Its mate I thought, or maybe its mother.
She preened him, groomed her loved one,
And I was consumed, to rest and sleep within her.

I remained for a time, but not too long,
For soon I was set loose upon the wet ground.
Where a seed gracefully pitied me and took me in,
A friend I had made, though she uttered no sound.

We grew together, the seed and me, entwined,
Like lovers brought together across the ages.
The world had kept us apart for eternity, but we were strong,
We endured against the odds and were paid our wages.

For we were together now, and would remain,
The world around us changing and flitting by.
I was back where I started, though she was here now,
We were a testament of love, of hope under the sky.

Guy Stimpson 2nd December 2006