three celebrations, of a kind: before, during, (perhaps) after

When we used to celebrate: Graduation—2019

Here they are. Glowing families. Looking like they’re not quite sure Where they are, where to go, what to think. Their mothers and fathers Would have been more gruffly dismissive of all this this

headlining of the intellect, this giving of laminated certificates, this passing of so many early years with soft hands, eyes dreaming

But they would’ve been more comfortable with the dressing up - that at least. They practiced that every Sunday.

Now these mothers, sisters, stumble on absurd heels, flap in wind-caught dresses, And these fathers, brothers, hesitate at corners, overheat in waistcoats, Fail to find wallets in unfamiliar jacket pockets

But that was the year before all this – now, to funerals

Nine-thirty a.m.: five administrators In black skirts, jackets, windswept black coats Emerging from the office block, where they had met, first time in a year, to set out together

crossing to the railway

Their lanyards still around their necks. Perhaps they wear them at the funeral, at the graveside. Against death: means of identification. The last time I went to a funeral

I had driven 375 miles. It was raining. In the near-empty crematorium car park We watched someone make an awful mess Of parking a small Toyota.

We cling to life through small things.

And, more recently, when we had not stirred from the house in many months: we celebrate a kind of freedom

How early we were about this morning. A sharp spring chill. A drive

Up through Killearn, Fintry, the high Campsie hill, Unrolling the ailing country

A map that had been folded and forgotten.

I have been suffering terrible dreams All vertiginous, out of control, crushing wrenching falling

In the very green fields the lambs growing-not-knowing. What did you dream On that cold night? How can you live Without doomed foresight?

You look at me squarely as if to say You know very well.

The jackdaws scatter at our approach.