The Good Funeral Guide

In October a great Palestininian poet died. Taha Muhammed Ali was self taught and, all his life, earned his living as a shopkeeper in Nazareth. He was witness all of the agonies and upheavals of the time – but but when he thought of his own death dreamt only of sleep and tea. Here’s the poem he wrote:

Tea and Sleep

If, over this world, there’s a ruler
who holds in his hand bestowal and seizure,
at whose command seeds are sewn,
as with his will the harvest ripens,
I turn in prayer, asking him
to decree for the hour of my demise,
when my days draw to an end,
that I’ll be sitting and taking a sip
of weak tea with a little sugar
from my favorite glass
in the gentlest shade of the late afternoon
during the summer.
And if not tea and afternoon,
then let it be the hour
of my sweet sleep just after dawn.

*

And may my compensation be —
if in fact I see compensation —
I who during my time in this world
didn’t split open an ant’s belly,
and never deprived an orphan of money,
didn’t cheat on measures of oil
or violate a swallow’s veil;
who always lit a lamp
at the shrine of our lord, Shihab a-Din,
on Friday evenings,
and never sought to beat my friends
or neighbors at games,
or even those I simply knew;
I who stole neither wheat nor grain
and did not pilfer tools
would ask —
that now, for me, it be ordained
that once a month,
or every other,
I be allowed to see
the one my vision has been denied —
since that day I parted
from her when we were young.

*

But as for the pleasures of the world to come,
all I’ll ask
of them will be —
the bliss of sleep, and tea.

If you’re minded you can hear him read it here. The arabic version is first (worth it just for the sounds and rhythms) and then the translation.

Posted by Sweetpea

I am fascinated by those lesser explored emotions at funerals.  When I visit a family, I carry poetry and music with me for those who are struggling to find expression.  Of course, it’s comparatively easy to find things which talk about love in its more conventional forms – we are almost swamped with choice, and it’s more a matter of which individual poem or song speaks best to them.  Much harder to find things which express those often felt, but more rarely explored, ambivalent feelings.   Perhaps we could share some here?  I’ll start you off with this one by Laura Marling. She’s a wonderful singer/songwriter.  Her lyrics are complicated and haunting. This is from her album ‘I Speak Because I Can’.

Blackberry Stone

Well I own this field,
And I wrote this sky,
And I have no reason, to reason with you.

I’d be sad that I never held your hand as you were lowered,
but I’d understand that I’d never let it go.
I’d be sad that I never held your hand as you were lowered,
but I’d understand that the world does what it does.

And you never did learn to let the little things go,
And you never did learn to let me be,
And you never did learn to let little people grow
And you never did learn how to see.

But I’ll whisper that I love this man,
Now, and for forever, to your soul as it floats out of the window.
To the world that you turned your back on,
To the world that never really let you be,

And I am lower now and lower still,
And you did always say that one day I would suffer.
You did always say that people get their pay.
You did always say that I was going places,
And that you wouldn’t have it any other way.

But I couldn’t turn my back on a world for what I lack wouldn’t let me
But I couldn’t turn my back on a world for what I like I need it
But I couldn’t turn my back on a world for what I lack wouldn’t let me
But I couldn’t turn my back on a world for what I like I need it
And I shouldn’t turn my back on sweet smelling blackberry stone.

And here’s the song itself:

Posted by Vale

‘Aren’t undertakers old, gray of complexion, gaunt and, well, creepy?’

It’s the opening question in a 2007 article in America’s Obit magazine and, of course, the answer is no – as evidenced by the photographs shown in a calendar displaying all that is best of American male mortician manhood.

The Calendars were for charity and the mortician who organised the shoot – Kenneth McKenzie who has a funeral home in Long Beach, California – sees them as a humorous way to dispel the notion that morticians “are gray-haired and hunchbacked with no personality.”

Have a look at the original article to check for yourselves:

http://www.obit-mag.com/articles/omg-men-of-mortuaries

But I think a gauntlet has been thrown down in the USA. Anyone want to pick it up? And does anyone want to nominate a likely candidate?

In Loving Memory from Barry Dignam on Vimeo.

A great little film, this. Just 10 mins long. It’s all about the bonds of love. Don’t pass it up.

Thanks to James Showers of the Family Tree Funeral Company.

Funeral Mariachi by the Sun City Girls.

Info about the Sun City Girls here (and on Wikipedia).

Great gift idea for the trainee embalmer in your life. Available on eBay.

A delightful dancing skeleton – and a journey through Limbo…