acts of remembrance

Together with the local councillor I persuaded the council to rescue Mary’s bench and put it in Mount Place where there’s a footbridge over the canal and trees shade a small square, and people come and go. I commissioned a shiny new plaque and invited people to re-dedicate the bench with a reading of Mary’s poems. So one sunny summer evening a group of us gathered round the bench – neighbours chatted about the weather, a couple who live nearby came on a romantic evening out, a woman strolling with her grandson in a pushchair stopped by while he slept – and together we took time to listen to the wind in the trees, and to Mary’s words singing in each of us.