Cemetary Gates

A dreaded sunny snowy day

So I meet you at the cemetery gates

Keats and Yeats are on your side

While Wilde is on mine

So we go inside and we gravely read the stones

All those people, all those lives

Where are they now?

With loves, and hates

And passions just like mine

They were born

And then they lived

And then they died

It seems so unfair

I want to cry

You say, "'Ere thrice the sun done salutation to the dawn"

And you claim these words as your own

But I've read well, and I've heard them said

A hundred times (maybe less, maybe more)

If you must write prose/poems

The words you use should be your own

Don't plagiarise or take "on loan"

'Cause there's always someone, somewhere

With a big nose, who knows

And who trips you up and laughs

When you fall

You say: "'Ere long done do does did"

Words that could only be your own

And then produce the text

From whence was ripped

Some dizzy whore, 1804

A dreaded sunny day

So let's go where we're wanted

And I meet you at the cemetery gates

Keats and Yeats are on your side

But you lose

'Cause weird lover Wilde is on mine

Cemetery Gates by Morrissey & Johnny Marr

If being blown about on top of Barr Beacon hadn't been enough of a challenge, this week's local walk took us around Heath Lane Cemetary in West Bromwich the day after Storm Eunice hit, leaving driving sleet and icy temperatures in her wake.

Neither of us was aware of the Pauper's Memorial at Heath End Cemetary until Marjorie, a Canadian Facebook friend posted a photo she'd found whilst researching her family history and I was keen to see it for myself. The memorial was unveiled in 2008 and designed by artist Andy Scholes and commemorates paupers buried at public expense in unmarked graves. 

The oldest grave dates back to the early part of the 19th Century and the cemetery is still in use today. I found it rather moving to see graves of the recently departed alongside the Victorian residents who'd died almost two hundred years ago, offering eternal companionship from beyond the grave. 

There were memorials to many young men killed in the wars. I didn't notice that young Leslie had died in an attack by a German U-Boat on my birthday until I downloaded the photo.

 

Poor James Robinson, who died at the age of 35, A sudden chance at God's command he fell, he had not time to bid his friends farewell.

Here's a recently erected memorial. John Lesley Woodward was local lad & part of the quintet of musicians that went down with The Titanic playing on whilst the ship sank in an attempt to calm the passengers' nerves. His body was never recovered and, the youngest of ten children, until the public petitioned for him to have his own memorial his name was an addition to his family's headstone.

This is the first Zerah I've come across. 

I'm fascinated by the symbolism of the carvings on headstones. Oak leaves represent stability, strength and endurance, urns represent the death of the flesh, fruit represents eternal plenty and a broken pillar represents a life cut short.

The Archangel Michael, the Christian angel of death is always represented clothed in armour and standing on a dragon. His sword, along with his hands, has gone astray over the years. 

 

There's something life-affirming about wandering around a cemetery and reading the inscriptions of lives long forgotten. Don't waste your life worrying about the future, they seem to say, enjoy your life, live in the here and now, you'll be keeping us company soon enough.

Poor Lord Jon soaked to the skin and chilled to the bone. An afternoon of trashy TV, tea and biscuits await.

I cannot believe this track is almost forty years old, I remember buying The Queen is Dead on vinyl from John Menzies in 1986 like it was yesterday (and yes, I still have it!)

See you soon!