For My Father’s Funeral, Go Out Singing

snails

Today is my father’s memorial service so I suspend my weekly sports post to share a Jacques Prévert poem that will conclude the ceremony. My father loved Prévert, translating a number of his poems and modeling his own light verse on that of the mid-20th century French poet. “Song of Two Snails on Their Way to a Funeral” has been set to music and will be sung by my daughter-in-law.

The poem was my mother’s choice and is perfect for the occasion. My father would have loved that we are using it for his funeral, with its advice not to mourn but to “take a glass of beer if your heart tells you to” or to “take, if you like, the bus to Paris” and “see the sights.”

My mother’s idea for a concluding poem was much better than my own, but I still have to share it. My father used to have his French classes learn and sing a drinking song and I had the idea of having those in attendance singing it as we wrapped up the service and made our way to the reception. Here are the opening and closing stanzas:

Chevaliers de la Table Ronde

Let’s taste and see if the wine is good (2x)


Refrain:

Let’s taste and see, oui, oui, oui,
Let’s taste and see, non, non, non
Let’s taste and see if the wine is good (2x)

When I die, I want them to bury me
In a cave where there is good wine (2x)

Refrain

My father would have approved this as well. But, as I say, my mother’s choice is much better, not to mention more appropriate to the occasion. Here it is:

Song of Two Snails on Their Way to a Funeral

By Jacques Prévert

Two snails were going to the funeral of a dead leaf.
Their shells were shrouded in black,
and they had wrapped crepe around their horns.
They set out in the evening,
one glorious autumn evening.
Alas, when they arrived
it was already spring.
The leaves who once were dead
had all sprung to life again.
The two snails were very disappointed.
But then the sun, the sun said to them,
“Take the time to sit awhile.
Take a glass of beer
if your heart tells you to.
Take, if you like, the bus to Paris.
It leaves this evening.
You’ll see the sights.
But don’t use up your time with mourning.
I tell you, it darkens the white of your eye
and makes you ugly.
Stories of coffins aren’t very pretty.
Take back your colours,
the colours of life.”
Then all the animals,
the trees and the plants
began to sing at the tops of their lungs.
It was the true and living song,
the song of summer.
And they all began to drink
and to clink their glasses.
It was a glorious evening,
a glorious summer evening,
and the two snails went back home.
They were moved,
and very happy.
They had had a lot to drink
and they staggered a little bit,
but the moon in the sky watched over them.

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