“Stop all the clocks

Turn off the telephone?”

I’ve already been told I can’t do “They fuck you up, your mum and dad” or the complete lyrics of ‘Angels’ by Robbie.  So here are my thoughts:

I’m thinking journeys.  Grandpa was not religious. Talking to my da he just told me that Grampa used to drop the family at church and go home to cook the dinner.  Seems  to me the best kind of Sunday service.  So God or anything too spiritual seems a bit of a no-no.  So journeys.  There are some beautiful words about travelling.

Here’s what I found so far:

Departure by Coventry Patmore

http://www.daypoems.net/poems/711.html

Remember by Rosetti

http://classiclit.about.com/cs/quotationslit/a/aa_rememberc.htm

Lights Out by Edward Thomas

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/lights-out/

It’s hard to find something appropriate for a Grandfather.  Most death verse seems to be about lovers.  I love ‘Rage, rage against the dying of the light’ but there was no raging at the end.  There were hospitals and drugs and wards.  There was a grieving family but most of all there was silence…  ‘And the rest is silence’?  Shakespeare maybe?  This must be pondered and discussed with those who matter and who I trust.

I just broke and typed in ‘poems for funerals’ into google.  I love google.  Anyone who does anything even vaguely creative loves google.  Found this:

http://www.milestonepress.co.uk/poems_for_funerals.htm

Looks like I am vaguely on the right track.  My da wanted me to do a poem called the Garden of Persephone:

http://www.angelfire.com/nj/persephone/gardenswinburne.html

It is indeed beautiful but seems a bit bleak.  I feel, personally, that a funeral should be a celebration of a life and not sure if this celebrates. 

This turns my mind to what I want – my legacy if I die.  I want Frank Turner’s ‘Long Live the Queen’, something by Emmy the Great or Darren Hayman and ‘Bring Me Sunshine’  for music.  I want there to be singing and dancing and jokes, people to laugh and think I had a good innings and love life as much as I do.  

I want this read at mine. Joyce Grenfell is one of my all-time heroes and her words always seem right to me:

Life Goes On

If I should go before the rest of you
Break not a flower
Nor inscribe a stone
Nor when I am gone
Speak in a Sunday voice
But be the usual selves
That I have known

Weep if you must
Parting is hell
But life goes on
So …. sing as well

Joyce Grenfell
1910-1979

Thoughtfully, over and out.