Grieving

 Leaving Glenageary 1981-2023 


We are grieving that we’re leaving

This modest nest we first moved into

When barely one year married 

And our firstborn about to come. 


Four decades later and it’s aged

Like us I guess and guards

So many memories of family 

No longer here but gone. 


Sifting through old photos

Foreign currency no longer current 

Ferry bookings and holiday plans 

A life revealed in tax returns. 


Give us the strength to simplify 

To eject what’s old and spent 

Imagine that next week we’re gone

This process falls to someone else. 


The Nordic countries toughened by the cold

Prepare for death decades before

Remove the clutter and excess 

Embrace a life requiring less. 


And so we must engage the clutch

Come down a gear without a fuss

Come full circle and so enjoy

A life devoid of old reports and clutter. 


As we bin the faded forms 

We shed a skin for after all

These modest objects have been our friends

Though hidden in the backs of drawers. 


I’ll keep the cap my father won

For playing rugby in the forties

Faded tassels after eighty years

Exam results from my year in Rome. 


Looking back we marvel how

We surfed life’s waves and now

We value maybe all the more

The courage of the days of yore. 


It’s gone, it’s binned - no looking back

It’s time now to walk a simpler track

Embrace a journey down a road

That leads to wisdom and perhaps to god. 

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