I visited your grave today.

I had some time to spare

and idle with.

I looked at the cross

the details written.

I’m older than you lived

and so lived more.

The names I know

on stone before me

are as close as you

I knew them just as little too.

Is that an oak behind

your grave?

In the field beyond?

How fitting for our clan.

Our clan I hardly know.

I walked along

the tidy paths

and rhymed off

names of strangers.

They may be family too.

I don’t know.

My cousins far away

know more than me

they knew you too.

For me,

you’ve never been,

more than

an image in my head.

Always dead.

Memories jealously held

by those who loved you

while I just wished

to be held

by the smiling man

in the picture.

AGS Sat 8th June 2019