Of human bondage

No longer enduring the chains
Of human bondage
His bones remain
Entombed in a mausoleum
Rustingly enclosed
And forgotten.

The lovely cemetery of All Saints Church in Whitstable (a church has stood on this site for at least 800 years) was the last stop in the Somerset Maugham walk around Whitstable today, as part of WhitLit, the town's first literary festival.

A series of events recalled the author's early years in the town, where he lived unhappily with his uncle, the Vicar of Whitstable, after the deaths of his parents. Maugham draws on those years in the fictional Blackstable in two of his novels, Of Human Bondage and Cakes and Ale.

This giant Victorian mausoleum surrounded by rusting metal railings pointing heavenwards has no engravings or signage. The inhabitant must have been an important person but is now a nobody.