Anyone who’s seen the highly successful film Four Weddings and a Funeral will be familiar with W H Auden’s famous poem, Funeral Blues, a poem that tends to crop up at many a real funeral service throughout the English-speaking world.
I used Auden’s poem as a starting point for this little bit of whimsy.
FUNERAL BLUES REVISITED
(With Apologies to W H Auden)
No need to stop the clocks for time itself has stopped
and should the telephone ring out, then let it go unheard.
The Steinway in the morning room stands silent now.
The dog, distracted by a juicy bone, forbears to bark.
In monumental silence, slowly, mourners come
with solemn step, with coffin and with muffled drum.
You were a world of things to me: my compass points,
my future, past. My every diary entry sang
your name and mine, our days of feast and fast.
Naive of me to think such things could last.
The sun and moon are surplus to requirements now.
The stars can be extinguished and the oceans drained.
Discard the beach, each grain of sand, each milligram.
Pack up the doves for nothing is now worth a damn.
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