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Back Poems and Readings for Funerals Save as PDF
Chapters (98)
  1. Cover
  2. About the Author
  3. Foreword
  4. REMEMBER ME WHEN I AM GONE AWAY …
  5. ‘Remember me when I am gone away’
  6. Heaven-Haven
  7. Life Goes On
  8. Living Each Day
  9. ‘Death is nothing at all’
  10. Remember Me
  11. ‘I’m here for a short visit only’
  12. ‘No longer mourn for me when I am dead’
  13. If Death is Kind
  14. Fare Well
  15. When I Died
  16. ‘Because I could not stop for Death’
  17. ‘I see myself now at the end of my journey’
  18. Requiem
  19. ‘I thought I’d write my own obituary’
  20. Think of Me Then
  21. The New Path
  22. Footprints in the Sand
  23. The Book
  24. The Legacy
  25. ‘A thing of beauty is a joy for ever’
  26. When I Have Fears
  27. A Song of Living
  28. ‘I should like to be buried in a summer forest’
  29. ‘I would not have a god come in’
  30. I’ve Made Out a Will
  31. Coda
  32. Rest
  33. Prayer
  34. A TINY LAMP HAS GONE OUT IN MY TENT …
  35. ‘You must not shut the night inside you’
  36. Prayer for the Little Daughter between Death and Burial
  37. Epitaph on a Child
  38. On the Death of a Child
  39. Four Candles
  40. Too Soon
  41. Requiescat
  42. ‘Promise you won’t forget about me, ever’
  43. HE WAS MY NORTH, MY SOUTH, MY EAST AND WEST …
  44. Funeral Blues
  45. ‘Music, when soft voices die’
  46. ‘As birds are fitted to the boughs’
  47. Farewell, Sweet Dust
  48. Echo
  49. The Kaleidoscope
  50. Verses Written on Her Deathbed at Bath to Her Husband in London
  51. A Widow’s Hymn
  52. ‘Time does not bring relief’
  53. Tomorrows
  54. ‘Never more will the wind’
  55. Marriage and Death
  56. Inseparable
  57. ‘Dear gentle soul, who went so soon away’
  58. In Memoriam E. S.
  59. WORN FEATURES OF ANCESTRAL MOULD …
  60. Highland Graveyard
  61. ‘Another and another and another’
  62. ‘Fear no more the heat o’ the sun’
  63. ‘By ways remote and distant waters sped’
  64. ‘Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore’
  65. Elegy
  66. I Wish You Enough
  67. While I Slept
  68. ‘Do not go gentle into that good night’
  69. Coat
  70. ‘The rooms and days we wandered through’
  71. The Friend
  72. ‘You can shed tears that she is gone’
  73. Inside Our Dreams
  74. Traditional Gaelic Blessing
  75. TO EVERY THING THERE IS A SEASON …
  76. ‘To every thing there is a season’
  77. ‘Our revels now are ended’
  78. So Many Different Lengths of Time
  79. ‘Come, fill the Cup’
  80. ‘Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth’
  81. ‘Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels’
  82. ‘Death be not proud’
  83. ‘Home is where one starts from’
  84. Dirge without Music
  85. ‘don’t tell me that I mourn too much’
  86. All Things Pass
  87. Earth
  88. On Death
  89. Gone from My Sight
  90. The Wheel
  91. Live Your Life
  92. Prayer
  93. Old Irish Toast
  94. For My Own Tomb-stone
  95. Notes
  96. Acknowledgements
  97. JULIA WATSON
  98. THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING

For the times we laughed,

The times we cried,

The times we were angry with each other,

The silly things you did,

The caring and joy you gave us.

This fourth candle we light for our love.

We light this candle that your light will always shine

As we enter this sad time and share this day of remembrance

With family and friends.

We cherish the special place in our hearts

That will always be reserved for you.

We thank you for the gift

Your living brought to each of us.

Anon.

Too Soon

This was a life

That had hardly begun

No time to find

Your place in the sun

No time to do

All you could have done

But we loved you enough for a lifetime.

No time to enjoy

The world and its wealth

No time to take life

Down off the shelf

No time to sing

The song of yourself

Though you had enough love for a lifetime.

Those who live long

Endure sadness and tears

But you’ll never suffer

The sorrowing years:

No betrayal, no anger,

No hatred, no fears, Just love – only love – in your lifetime.

Mary Yarnall (1955–)

Requiescat

Tread lightly, she is near

Under the snow,

Speak gently, she can hear

The daisies grow.

All her bright golden hair

Tarnished with rust,

She that was young and fair

Fallen to dust.

Lily-like, white as snow,

She hardly knew

She was a woman, so

Sweetly she grew.

Coffin-board, heavy stone,

Lie on her breast,

I vex my heart alone,

She is at rest.

Peace, Peace, she cannot hear

Lyre or sonnet,

All my life’s buried here,

Heap earth upon it.

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)

‘Promise you won’t forget about me, ever’

Then, suddenly again, Christopher Robin, who was still looking at the world with his chin in his hands, called out ‘Pooh!’

‘Yes?’ said Pooh.

‘When I’m – when – Pooh!’

‘Yes, Christopher Robin?’

‘I’m not going to do Nothing any more.’

‘Never again?’

‘Well, not so much. They don’t let you.’

Pooh waited for him to go on, but he was silent again.

‘Yes, Christopher Robin?’ said Pooh helpfully.

‘Pooh, when I’m – you know – when I’m not doing Nothing, will you come up here sometimes?’

‘Just Me?’

‘Yes, Pooh.’

‘Will you be here too?’

‘Yes, Pooh, I will be really. I promise I will be, Pooh.’

‘That’s good,’ said Pooh.

‘Pooh, promise you won’t forget about me, ever. Not even when I’m a hundred.’

Pooh thought for a little.

‘How old shall I be then?’

‘Ninety-nine.’

Pooh nodded.

‘I promise,’ he said.

Still with his eyes on the world Christopher Robin put out a hand and felt for Pooh’s paw.

‘Pooh,’ said Christopher Robin earnestly, ‘if I – if I’m not quite – ’ he stopped and tried again – ‘Pooh, whatever happens you will understand, won’t you?’

‘Understand what?’

‘Oh, nothing.’ He laughed and jumped to his feet. ‘Come on!’

‘Where?’ said Pooh.