Life in the Graveyard
Spring has sprung in St Eanswythe Churchyard. Life is resurrecting around me after a dreary, wet winter — except the churchyard’s underground residents, thankfully.
During my lunch hour, I come here for a few minutes so my eyes can relax from the blue-light strain and my mind can wander. The scent of spring is carried by a soft breeze whispering through trees dotted with almost-bursting buds. Not the scent of early-flowering honeysuckle or cut grass that wafts along residential roads, but of warming damp leaf litter and wild garlic. The smell excites a flutter in my chest — long sunny days and golden evenings are ahead, flowing into one another with cheap Pimms and music on the seafront. With a brain that limps through the winter months, I can’t wait.
The nagging caw of a crow sat on the spire tugs my attention back to spring. As I look around I make eye contact with a grey squirrel standing on Ann Cullen, who died on December 22nd 1819. The squirrel scampers up a naked sycamore tree and leaps into an ancient yew, which seeps and pips with a flock of long-tailed tits — one of my favourite birds. I watch as feral pigeons waddle through an unruly carpet of bluebell leaves. While the bodies below will lie forever still, the bluebell bulbs lie dormant, readying to erupt deep indigo blooms in a few weeks.
Ivy creeps along the fallen headstones leaning against the crumbling cobbled perimeter, most worn bare as the passing years eat away at their identities. Some stones have lost their words, but bold engravings survive to give the 21st century a snippet of those who lie beneath – one reads ‘SACRED’, another shows an ornate two-handled pot. Perhaps a late preacher and a cook? When I become bluebell fertiliser one day (hopefully not for a long time), I wonder what my limestone engraving will be. Something a bit more grandiose than a pot, I hope.
I scatter a half-eaten cereal bar on the cracked paving slabs for the small murder of crows that have now gathered above me, before turning to walk home. I’ll be back tomorrow.