Weeping ash in a churchyard

Weeping ash in a churchyard

A century keeping vigil over

those who need no vigilance, concealing

the sweeping shadows, the day’s declension,

the tolling year’s irrecoverable

loss from Easter through a bitter Friday,

one leafless limb yearning sunwards with no

expectation, one arm consoling the stones –

their names uninscribed, loving memories

invalidated – slowly curling down

to the patient, all-embracing earth.

I slip in step with the dying and dead

in sad processions, like tides which reach no

further than the edge and turn away, and,

for the short, wordy, retrospective path,

my forehead smeared with penitential ash.