And when death finds me

And when death finds me,

I hope it whispers,

“Come now,

the fight is done,”

and takes my hand gently,

like an old friend

who understands

why I’m so tired.

I hope it says,

“You've carried enough,

let me hold this weight for you.”

I hope it promises,

“Here there is quiet.

Here you can rest.”

Ticus Poetry

My life closed twice before its close

My life closed twice before its close— 
It yet remains to see 
If Immortality unveil 
A third event to me 

So huge, so hopeless to conceive 
As these that twice befell. 
Parting is all we know of heaven, 
And all we need of hell.

Emily Dickinson 1830 - 1886

The Attic

And after you were gone
And I knew
I would never see you again,
I folded my memory of you
And my love for you
Like an old lace shawl
That is too fragile
To be worn daily
And too precious to be thrown away
And placed them in a trunk
In the attic of my mind.

© 2007 William Fox Payne

Funeral Blues

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone.
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling in the sky the message He is Dead,
Put crêpe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever, I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

Wystan Hugh Auden  1907 - 1973

Away with funeral music

Away with funeral music - set
The pipe to powerful lips -
The cup of life's for him that drinks
And not for him that sips.

Robert Louis Stevenson 1850 - 1894

Requiescat

Tread lightly, she is near
Under the snow,
Speak gently, she can hear
The daisies grow.

All her bright golden hair
Tarnished with dust,
She that was young and fair
Fallen to dust.

Lily-white, 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, Avignon, 1854 – 1900

Time and Again

Time and again, however well we know the landscape of love,
and the little church-yard with lamenting names,
and the frightfully silent ravine wherein all the others
end: time and again we go out two together,
under the old trees, lie down again and again
between the flowers, face to face with the sky.

Rainer Maria Rilke 1875 – 1926