A Cage To Hold My Dreams
Thoughts In An English Churchyard
Yesterday was as quiet as a field of waving corn.
The ancient parish church stood empty and alone
An aroma of wax and camphor greeted us
as we swung open the solid oak door. Our footsteps
echoed eeerily on the uneven greystone floor
in this quiet corner of Stoke Poges which is
famous as the resting-place of Thomas Gray. In
another sheltered corner of this ancient graveyard
he wrote his famous Elegy.
I recited the opening lines of his immortal poem
from memory as we approached the church along
a concrete path laid between the graves of the
not-so-old and the hopelessly young. Declarations
of love and loss leapt at us from ancient inscriptions.
It was sad to think that these poignant
farewells carved so lovingly in stone were never
seen by those for whom they were written.
Strange, too, to reflect that ordinary medicines
and over-the-counter remedies available today would
have prolonged the lives of many buried here.
We sat on a wooden bench, she and I, as the sun
moved the shadows like chess-pieces around
these well-kept lawns. We read the marble
headstones of four young boys drowned off Land's
End during a school trip that went tragically wrong.
We talked about my family's grave in the south of
Ireland, where now lie aunts and uncles from
whom I learned through example and attentiveness
the importance or truth and trust, the value
of love, and how to enjoy solitude without hurting
anyone. She spoke about her parents, both, sadly,
gone, but frequently caught up in the machinery
of her thoughts. Hearing their names spoken,
our loved ones waved at us from inside our heads.
This place where Gray wrote his masterwork
reminded me of other churches where I have knelt
and prayed, one in particular, where goodbye
was whispered to a lady from whom it was
unimaginably cruel to be parted so young.
Yesterday made me think, 'Yes, its true, they aren't
here, but we are. We're free to think for ourselves,
to speak our minds. We could behave badly if
we wanted to, or fall in love or buy a dog'
The words of the Elegy suggest to me that the poet
felt as good about life and about himself as I do.
Perhaps the same bright sun lifted his spirits as high
as mine were yesterday, perhaps he sat on
the same bench that we did. Perhaps this quiet
corner of Buckinghamshire is the same now
as it was in his time. I imagine there was a woman
at his side just as there was with me.
The calm reflective atmosphere of an English
churchyard can make anyone of sensitivity think
about the world and their place in it.
But it takes a special woman to fuel desires above
the ordinary. A woman is the reason I sometimes
write better than good. A beautiful woman
makes me want to reach not just into her head
but into everybody's.
Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire 2001
The ancient parish church stood empty and alone
An aroma of wax and camphor greeted us
as we swung open the solid oak door. Our footsteps
echoed eeerily on the uneven greystone floor
in this quiet corner of Stoke Poges which is
famous as the resting-place of Thomas Gray. In
another sheltered corner of this ancient graveyard
he wrote his famous Elegy.
I recited the opening lines of his immortal poem
from memory as we approached the church along
a concrete path laid between the graves of the
not-so-old and the hopelessly young. Declarations
of love and loss leapt at us from ancient inscriptions.
It was sad to think that these poignant
farewells carved so lovingly in stone were never
seen by those for whom they were written.
Strange, too, to reflect that ordinary medicines
and over-the-counter remedies available today would
have prolonged the lives of many buried here.
We sat on a wooden bench, she and I, as the sun
moved the shadows like chess-pieces around
these well-kept lawns. We read the marble
headstones of four young boys drowned off Land's
End during a school trip that went tragically wrong.
We talked about my family's grave in the south of
Ireland, where now lie aunts and uncles from
whom I learned through example and attentiveness
the importance or truth and trust, the value
of love, and how to enjoy solitude without hurting
anyone. She spoke about her parents, both, sadly,
gone, but frequently caught up in the machinery
of her thoughts. Hearing their names spoken,
our loved ones waved at us from inside our heads.
This place where Gray wrote his masterwork
reminded me of other churches where I have knelt
and prayed, one in particular, where goodbye
was whispered to a lady from whom it was
unimaginably cruel to be parted so young.
Yesterday made me think, 'Yes, its true, they aren't
here, but we are. We're free to think for ourselves,
to speak our minds. We could behave badly if
we wanted to, or fall in love or buy a dog'
The words of the Elegy suggest to me that the poet
felt as good about life and about himself as I do.
Perhaps the same bright sun lifted his spirits as high
as mine were yesterday, perhaps he sat on
the same bench that we did. Perhaps this quiet
corner of Buckinghamshire is the same now
as it was in his time. I imagine there was a woman
at his side just as there was with me.
The calm reflective atmosphere of an English
churchyard can make anyone of sensitivity think
about the world and their place in it.
But it takes a special woman to fuel desires above
the ordinary. A woman is the reason I sometimes
write better than good. A beautiful woman
makes me want to reach not just into her head
but into everybody's.
Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire 2001
