Poem of the week: Anniversary Mother

And how do the mute phenomena of the
world
take the big dark to themselves and in
stride? Dew-spangled grassblades, leaves of
the great oak the ash the sycamore, hushed
patience of mushrooms edging into light
overnight, or the wild golden eye of the
tufted duck . . . not to mention dustbins and
holly berries, or the roses (blowing or blown or
in the bud) we would take stock of
on our walks ... Not to mention that empty
park bench standing silent in the same city
park where we'd sit in silence together,
watching the world go by: the bench a
memorial in my mind now to her patient
unexpecting self now she's gone (to
heaven, she'd like me to say) underground
these past twenty-five years of bewildering
this, that, and t'other, that she one way or
another would always say "yes" to, getting
on with her living them, deep in the
ordinary happenstance of accident or design
(all the same to her in the end) just getting
on with it, and again I can hear her laugh
with her heart at something I'd said and
saying Go on, get along with you! ... and I
would.

Eamon Grennan has published many collections of poetry, including There Now (Gallery Press, 2015) which won the 2016 Piggot Prize for Best Collection