Eulogy

[brightpearl]

In this thread we contemplate mortality and the ever-changing nature of the universe by eulogizing ourselves, each other, or anyone/anything we choose, a la John Cleese, to hilarious effect.

(I posted these before, but here they are for quick reference)
John Cleese delivers Graham Chapman's eulogy:


John Cleese delivers his own eulogy:


I'll start.

Brightpearl was a fine, upstanding member of this online community, always ready to lend a virtual hand or offer a scoop of appalling ice cream. She loved cheese and ludicrously green olive oil. I did wish she would shut up about pie and Boards of Canada sometimes, but that's neither here nor there. If only she hadn't eaten that last Funyun (tm), she wouldn't have been so cruelly torn from us as the young, young, completely zit-free age of 29.

27! I meant 27.

Anyway.

Time to spread the ashes.
Carp! We've brought the cat litter by mistake. Look, just toss it over the side; no one'll know the difference!

*cough cough*

It's just like the wind to change direction...
Hopefully she'll be reborn as a friendly goat or a contented whale or something, and not an oyster. Again.

Thank you all for coming, and do remember to live each moment as though it were your last.
And stay away from Funyuns (tm).

[brightpearl]

We are gathered here today to bear witness to the lives of my son's seamonkeys. Good little pets were they, if a little boring. I must say, they weren't very good conversationalists. But at least they didn't bite. And they hardly ever went outside the litterbox.

Their passing, after such short and inexplicably upside-down existences, gives us the opportunity to reflect on the fragility of life, and its perpetually inexplicable misorientation. May it offer us the reminder we need to enjoy each fleeting moment as it comes, upside-down or not. They've left us countless thousands of tiny hatchlings to remember them by, and also some nondescript green sludgy stuff which is likely their mortal remains.

They'll be missed.

*flush*

In closing, I would like to read this poem by Emily Dickinson. Try not to think about how it can be sung to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas," as indeed can every flipping verse she ever penned.

I measure every grief I meet
With analytic eyes;
I wonder if it weighs like mine,
Or has an easier size.

I wonder if they bore it long,
Or did it just begin?
I could not tell the date of mine,
It feels so old a pain.

I wonder if it hurts to live,
And if they have to try,
And whether, could they choose between,
They would not rather die.

I wonder if when years have piled--
Some thousands--on the cause
Of early hurt, if such a lapse
Could give them any pause;

Or would they go on aching still
Through centuries above,
Enlightened to a larger pain
By contrast with the love.

The grieved are many, I am told;
The reason deeper lies,--
Death is but one and comes but once
And only nails the eyes.

There's grief of want, and grief of cold,--
A sort they call 'despair,'
There's banishment from native eyes,
In sight of native air.

And though I may not guess the kind
Correctly yet to me
A piercing comfort it affords
In passing Calvary,

To note the fashions of the cross
Of those that stand alone
Still fascinated to presume
That some are like my own.

[Anna]

I suspect they were killed by inflation

[12"razormix]

.



.

[brightpearl]

^That is effing *brilliant*. Harry Pryor...he he he.

[trisherina]

Good poem for death of a pet:

Grieve not, nor
speak of me
with tears,
but laugh and
talk of me
as if I were
beside you
I loved you so. . .
Twas Heaven
here with you.

Isla Paschal Richardson

No, no dead pets at the moment but the next one to go will be a heartwrencher.

[Pixie Cherries]

[seebe]

^^ hahahaha That's beautiful, thanks Pearlie. My computer has been raised from the dead faster than Jesus. It was the power supply and chip set fan.

[Anna]

<--- mine

see ya - open bar

[brightpearl]

Sometimes this thread is sadder than at other times.


Come, night; come, Romeo; come, thou day in night;
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night
Whiter than new snow on a raven's back.
Come, gentle night, come, loving, black-brow'd night,
Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun.

~Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 2

I made a casserole.

[brightpearl]

All Is Well
Henry Scott Holland (1847-1918)
Canon of St Paul's Cathedral

Death is nothing at all,
I have only slipped into the next room
I am I and you are you
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.
Call me by my old familiar name,
Speak to me in the easy way which you always used
Put no difference in your tone,
Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow
Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was,
Let it be spoken without effect, without the trace of shadow on it.
Life means all that it ever meant.
It it the same as it ever was, there is unbroken continuity.
Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?
I am waiting for you, for an interval, somewhere very near,
Just around the corner.
All is well.

*sigh*
Piles of casseroles.

[brightpearl]

Dear long-lost friend,
I am sorry to hear of your passing. You were a hyper little bastard when I knew you, and your hair was always messed up, and you drove your sister and I freaking nuts. But you were gorgeous and bright, and I hope you are all right.
With kind remembrance,
brightpearl

[brightpearl]

Oh lord, I don't know how I would have made it without you sometimes. I'm so grateful to you for staying with me until I could bear to let you go. Giving you cream cheese was one of my few joys in life for a while, and I only wish I could have given you a kidney as well.
I can still smell your perpetually spotless fur, my darling, and see your beautiful pink toes. I found you on the street, but you were a king.

You had gotten so frail, so frail, but right now in my mind's eye you are still racing full tilt out of the woods after a little brown rabbit that you had no hope of catching, but damn, you sure were alive. You used to try to get me to let you out to chase the geese, remember? Haha, they would have had you for lunch, but it was so much fun to watch you dream.

Tonight I feel like I'll never have room for another cat in my heart again, but someday I'll come across one that reminds me of you, and I won't have a chance.

I hope heaven is made of tuna, though I could never stand the smell.

xo.

[Brynn]

So very very sorry, my friend. My condolences. He sounds like he was a very wonderful cat. He was very handsome as well.

[brightpearl]

Oh, he was very handsome, and didn't he know it.
I like all cats, really, but this one was really special, very smart and very tuned into me, somehow.
His name was Atlas, because in his bearing, you could see the weight of the world resting on his shoulders, even when he was a kitten. I never felt like a cat loved me before, but that one did. He was lovely.

Thanks, Brynn.