After the cremation service the fresh air.

"I never forget a mask,"

I said to someone i'd never met,

an attempt at grim humour.

 

The embarrassing marquee behind us

pallbearers upright in their black masks,

so long in the waiting. 

Truth is I had felt disconnected

 

but grief can spread like ripples

from a stone cast into water

at the downcast head of one

I knew so well

burdened then bereaved,

at the bravery of reading the eulogy to Patsy his wife

fifty six years wed.