The Coming

And God held in his hand
A small globe. Look, he said.
The son looked. Far off,
As through water, he saw
A scorched land of fierce
Colour. The light burned
There; crusted buildings
Cast their shadows: a bright
Serpent, a river
Uncoiled itself, radiant
With slime.

On a bare
Hill a bare tree saddened
The Sky. Many people
Held out their thin arms
To it, as though waiting
For a vanished April
To return to its crossed
Boughs. The son watched
Them. Let me go there, he said.

~R.S. Thomas (1972)

When I started to dance again I felt ridiculous.

We covered miles of ground.
Walls and earthworks we fortified -
lonely nights spent guarding lines.

This crooked street for commerce
That one for death.
Each had seemed a gentle place at first.

I have looked at my Release a dozen times
and mouthed the Business English written there
I worry that my limbs are leaden weights.

The syncopated measure a mere wave.
That singer's words only invitation
and nothing adequately brutal.

The call has gone forth for bad obituary poetry. I happen to have a few things on my hard disk which I scribbled down a few years ago which appeared in our parish magazine here in Scotland a few months back - published, I might add, rather hesitantly by the editor. A buddy of mine back in Montreal edits his parish magazine and I note that there was no hesitation in picking them up and reprinting them there. Just goes to show that bad taste works well in the Americas where it is treated as a commodity.

My husband's no longer alive
He insisted that he could still drive.
In lieu of carnations
our church needs donations.
The funeral's on Tuesday at five.

Dear Mummy has gone off to heaven.
She died yesterday at eleven.
The funeral's not private
so try to arrive at
the funeral parlour at seven.

Did anyone know Alvin Fetter,
the inveterate drunkard and debtor.
His family's bereft
but a few things are left.
If he owed you please send us a letter.

We're all feeling sorry for Ed,
especially now that he's dead.
We still find it odd
and wonder why God
didn't go and take Grandma instead.


respectfully submitted
R. Rabbit

I find obituaries, in the main, to be terribly written. They are generally composed by a junior member of the newspaper staff according to a set formula. I have been suggesting to families, for some time now, that they try to write their own obituaries for departed family members. I tell them to use the cadences and rhythms which come most naturally to them. Our families have certainly risen to the challenge:

My husband's no longer alive.
He insisted that he could still drive.
In lieu of carnations
our church needs donations.
His funeral's on Tuesday at five.

Dear Mummy has gone off to heaven.
She died yesterday at eleven.
The funeral's not private
so try to arrive at
the funeral parlour at seven.

Did anyone know Alvin Fetter
the inveterate drunkard and debtor?
His family's bereft
but a few things are left.
If he owed you please send us a letter.

We're all feeling sorry for Ed,
especially now that he's dead.
We sure find it odd
and wonder why God
didn't go and take Grandma instead.