Our local cemetery is about a third of the way between our house and the nearest shops. It’s a beautiful place. Serene.
Full of love and grief, of stories barely told.
Today, of necessity walking to the shops, thanks to my broken wrist (I’ve been advised not to drive) I took the slight diversion it affords from the main road.
Just a few feet through a gate, one of the cemetery paths parallels the road. As you pass through the gate the traffic noise is hushed, as if by divine decree.
Actually, it’s because of a slight bank and newly planted monkey puzzle trees that lie between the graves and the outer pavement.
I usually find myself distracted by the angels, the weeping women, the carved books and inscriptions.
But today I stopped before a glossy, reddish-brown marble memorial. Obelisk-style, with a pedestal and stone border. There were three names on it.
Mary’s name was nearest the top. She died in her 59th year in 1926.
George, her husband, died in his 60th year, in 1927.
A large gap led my eyes to the base of the obelisk.
There hid little Norman, ‘interred’ elsewhere. He died, aged 13 months, in 1906.
We can fill in those blank details in whatever way we choose. Or choose not to think about the three human beings who are no more. Their loves, their lives, their sorrows. And, in the case of Norman, the unfairness of that abruptly terminated existence.
Beneath the obelisk, on the pedestal, are inscribed the words:
‘Peace, perfect peace’
Which rewrote the story I had written in my head.
Well, that’s all I want to say, today, this eve of all the hallowed, the departed souls who are – if you are a believer – now in heaven. Saints, in other words.
When garish orange is everywhere and a witch in nylon robes serves me in my local bakery, the departed souls in the graveyard were a rather effective antidote to cynicism.
Now I must return to work.
May they rest in peace.
MEMOIRS OF A HUSK 
What a beautiful blue sky to offset the marble angels. Did you notice the blue flowers one of them held? Very peaceful looking place.
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Yes, I saw the blue flowers and tried to take a more direct picture but it wouldn’t work. The blue skies were last week, today is as per the one at the end! Still peaceful and in fact rather more so.
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That’s beautiful, and by any standards a quality graveyard.
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Isn’t it? Across the road by the Catholic church is another stretch with some less glamorous headstones, but still beautiful.
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‘Is not short paine well borne, that brings long ease,
And layes the soul to sleepe in quiet grave?
Sleepe after toyle, port after stormie seas,
Ease after warre, death after life does greatly please’
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I am embarrassed to have had to look that up. Perfect. Thank you.
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Who reads Spenser now…?
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As of today (I am done with the editing) me! I am going into town to the local independent bookshop to buy reading material for my holiday for my wrist. Also Milton. Listened to Philip Pullman – 5x short lunchtime broadcasts now available as one, talking about his inspiration and method of working, on BBC R 4. Hew reads a small section of Paradise Lost which he studied for A level-wow. (I didn’t do A level English out of sheer perversity.)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09c1y3m
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Thanks for the link…I’ll settle down to that in the evening! Glad your editing is over. Best wishes for the results.
I have to be in the mood for Milton…and undisturbed!
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The photos are lovely, and I like what you said about stories. I’m involved with a local theatre company that contracts with the county museum of history to dramatize some the stories of people buried in our oldest cemetery. We just finished this year’s performances. The museum does the historical research, and we write and perform the scripts. On weekdays, school children are brought by bus to the cemetery to see the performances. The cemetery management is happy to host the event because it decreases vandalism to show young people something about the once-like-them humaan beings buried there. When I pass or have occasion to enter a cemetery, I,too, think about the stories.
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Sorry it took me so long to reply, finally got an 88,000 document, edited down from 99,000 words with my broken right wrist, in the post on Saturday. Now having a holiday!
I love this idea! I shall pass it on to my script writing friends. And you have sparked a thought in me for a story too…. Thanks Miz B!
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A fortunate trip on that day to connect ideas. Minds are wonderful things!
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Indeed! And yes, it was a nice coincidence. I used to love Halloween when it was understated and a pause for thought Ah well.
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