It was a difficult week. A week of anxiety, a week of grief, and then of acceptance. Kevin died.

On the surface, everything at school seems more or less the same, but the veils that conceal reality have parted. Kevin is dead.

Listen, Kevin. Your passing called us, even for a brief while, back to what we are. Threads from our Celtic roots wove patterns into our prayers and rituals. On the altar at school, 17 candles, representing your sojourn here, created a fresco of shadows and lights. News of your bizarre accident stunned us. We united in prayer for your recovery.

You were placed on a life-support machine, giving us cause for deep concern. Negotiating the matter directly with heaven, we told God that you loved the world, that you had much good to do in this life and that your death would be a senseless loss.

For our Celtic ancestors, religious belief supplied the oxygen, in their ambition to defeat death and the terror it brought. And so it was with us. Four days, four nights dragged clumsily by. The boundaries of reality became blurred. Death laid its hand on you, mid-week.

It came and pointed to you, but found itself face to face with your parents, sisters, brothers and friends. For a time it backed off. You heard their muted murmur begging you to fight. We joined with them in offering you the entire reservoir of our energy. Silently and audibly we invoked all the saints and ancestral spirits to race to your rescue.

Time was suspended, but then the clock again began to mark the seconds. Death had lost. But it still circled around, grumbling. It came with a light step some hours later.

Samhain, the turning point of the Celtic year, will always bring to mind his passing. The Wheel of Life turns through Samhain, Imbolc, Bealtaine and Lughnasa - representing death, birth, growth and fruitfulness. Four people are given the chance of a new lease of life from his donated organs. His beautiful eyes were left untouched.

During his funeral Mass we traced the journey of his life. It was like looking at old photographs and remembering the happiest times of the past. We celebrated the gifts he had given us in life, and all of us said goodbye and prayed in our own way.

The climax of the service came at the offering of the gifts. A sod of turf was offered, symbolising Kevin's love of the land. The love of the earth has always been a strong feature of the Celt. He saw no false division between the sacred and the secular - all is blessed.

Eyes brimmed with tears. Sobs and sniffles echoed the old tradition of the Caoineadh, while family and friends let the emotion of loneliness and grief flow in a natural way.

Birds sang a lament, so it sounded, as Kevin's body was laid to rest. The mist let down its veil at the horizon, and the green fields gave colour in the midst of the gloom.

It has been said that the misery of tragedy makes everyone equal. Young people and the young at heart stood side by side at Kevin's grave, as at a threshold. Privilege was blown away like smoke, and we were all humbled.

An image of Kevin crossed my inner vision. I saw him heading into the mist with a bag thrown over his shoulder, striding peacefully to his eternal home.

We miss you, Kevin. Ar dheis De go raibh d'anam.