Commentary Families make us who we are. What remains after they’re gone? The author, third from the left, and her family. (Courtesy Jennifer Beard) I’ve always loved Philip Larkin’s poem, "The Mower." When the narrator's lawnmower stalls in long grass, he finds a hedgehog “jammed up against the blades, / Killed.” He ruminates on “its unobtrusive world": “The first day after a death, the new absence is always the same; we should be careful of each other, we should be kind.