At the Death of Every Year

Death of Every Year


It's a long journey to the back of the cemetery. It takes a great deal of walking to leave the sounds of the city behind. The journey is such that you could begin when the sun is at its highest point and you would not reach the destination until the sun dies.

I have taken this path so often that I know it intimately deep inside of my heart. Yet the path never seems any shorter, nor is it any less strenuous. My legs always ache as I force myself to walk step after step and my heart always gets heavier as I climb that hill.

The path begins straight, cutting neatly through the sectioned graves. I hate the walk in the beginning. The dead roam here. I must always keep myself from looking around at my surroundings. I am afraid every time I catch a glimpse of a tattered robe and a wrinkly hand out of the corner of my eye. They start to speak once I see them. I can hear their dusty, gravelly voices calling out to me as I pass their prisons.

"Mary," they call. "Mary Devine, come to us," they moan, they plead.

Year after year, the emptiness in their voices never fails to send shivers down my spine. When I hear them, my eyes try to look at them; my feet try to walk to them. But I can't allow them to lure me away from the path. I fear what would happen should I go with them. I don't think I would ever be free.

The only thing worse than the ill-confined ghosts is the presence of the cemetery's patrons, those who profess to live. I fear them as much as I fear the ghosts. They kneel or stand beside the gravestones of dead relatives. They mourn, they cry, they remember. They never realize that sometimes the spirits of the deceased are with them, mourning as well. I keep to myself as I walk. Passing like a wraith through their midst pains me every single time. It hurts when I feel their gazes pierce my skin and go right through me. But I fear these patrons of the cemetery. I keep my eyes away from them so that I will never have to see their faces should they one day notice my passage.

I breathe a little easier the further I go. The patrons retreat with the sun to seek the comforts of home and light. As the path begins to slope, the way becomes narrow. This part of the journey is always difficult because broken bricks and slippery ice hide on the ground as the path winds its way through a myriad of poorly planned gravesites. Eventually even the sharp the words on the stones fade. Cracks, rust, and mold dominate the marble and the iron wedged into the hillside. These graves are older than the rest and I need not fear their dead occupants. The souls have been long gone, off to wherever ghosts go. There is no one to bother me on this final leg.

It's a long journey to the top of the hill at the back of the cemetery but it is a journey that I must take at the death every year.

I shiver and wrap my long coat tightly around my body even though I know that nothing will ever rid me of this chill. I squint through the thinning fog and fancy that I can see the top of the hill. I gather the folds of my shadowy skirt and dig my dainty boots into the frozen ground. The top of the hill is always further away than it looks for it took me another ten minutes to reach the top. I spared a moment then to look over my shoulder at the dark cemetery and mark that the time it takes to complete my journey still hasn't changed for it is the dead of night.

There is a grave further back in the trees. It has been there no longer than those that surround it but it appears to be more ancient every year. Whereas once it was in the middle of a grassy plot, it is now wedged into the undergrowth of the trees. I believe that it has been forgotten for long blades of overgrown grass are frozen in place. Frost-bitten leaves lie entangled in the growth and mat it down with no hope of disentanglement. Ivy is now reaching up from the bed and it all but swallows the ancient stone.

I slide my stiff fingers from my thin gloves and reach to brush the ivy away from the precious stone. The words are weather-worn and faded but I can still remember what they say as I run my bare fingers over the indentations.

It read:

Mary Devine
"Blessed are the pure, for they will see God"

Not so pure after all, I suppose.

It's a long journey to the grave on the top of the hill at the back of the cemetery. But this is a journey that I must take at the death of every single year.