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Structure is not the enemy of emotion.
When grief is raw, a blank page can feel impossible. A clear eulogy structure does not make the tribute cold or manufactured. It gives the love somewhere to land.
The room does not need to see the framework. It needs to feel the person.
Think in two jobs.
The celebrant leads the service. The eulogy brings the person back into the room. When those two jobs get blurred, people often reach for ceremony language and lose the human voice.
Start with one true memory. Then ask: what story sounds most like them? That is usually where the real tone returns. You do not need polished tribute language. You need something recognisable, speakable and true.
Jerusalem. Words by William Blake.
Funeral Tribute for my Father
My father's funeral took place on Monday 30th December 2013 at 10am. This is my funeral tribute.
My greatest fear since I was a little girl was that my father would die. My dad and I would speak of it often. He would show me where to find him if ever he left - in the trees, and the stars and the sky.
My partner's father died of the exact same thing - pneumonia, sepsis, renal failure - only a month before my father died. I remember having to fly to Johannesburg that day for work and being able to spend the evening with my father. We spoke of unexpected death, the shock of loss and funerals. I said to him that I would never ever come to his funeral, that it would be too upsetting for me. I remember my father's wonderfully dramatic response, "Oh no, Elaine. You must go and tell them marvelous things about me."
My father had a remarkable capacity for love. On the afternoon before his death, I was reading him poems from one of the anthology of poems he had put together. He was on life support and heavily sedated. Regardless of how drugged he was, when I read him Dylan Thomas'"Do not go gentle into that good night", he responded. At the line, "And you, my father, there on the sad height, curse bless me now with your fierce tears", he lifted his neck, opened his eyes and tears poured down his face. I remember thinking at the time how utterly extraordinary it was that someone at their darkest hour, on their deathbed literally, was able to continue to give me the love that I so badly needed. It was such a testament to the notion of "Gracious Gifting" and the power of Love to rise above any obstacle.
My father was a brilliant, irreverent,ecclectic man. He even dedicated one of his blogposts to the origins of quinoa. He had a passion for literature and music and perhaps for me in my memories of him, most strongly for cooking. We would spend many an evening drinking and cooking together, listening to amazing music while we tried out new experiments. My father was an amazing cook but he was also incapable of making the same thing twice. His stews and steaks and roasts were legendary as were his plain mad concoctions like popcorn on pizza .
My father was a surrogate dad to so many people here today. He had an expansiveness, a generosity of spirit and a deep belief in the power of love which was truly transformative for anyone who came into contact with him. He was a compassionate man who loved his friends and family with a fierceness of heart.
I have an image of him now at great heights: Uncle Piet is braaing, uncle Tony and my father are arm in arm, drink in hand, weeping and bellowing the lines from William Blake's Jerusalem, "Bring me my arrows of desire...bring me my chariot of fire."; while goggy and gerty sit on small braai chairs fondly shaking their heads and saying, "Ai, daai Frank."
I wrote a poem for my father on the day that he died that I would like to share with you today.
On His Death - For my Father by Elaine Rumboll I searched the sky The trees And the stars To find you As you said I should do If you ever died. It was the shortest night Of the year That you died in So I found you in the wind That wrapped me In the sweetest Summer breeze On a bench in The early morning It sang to me Of your fierce tears Your Love Your never ending Presence It reminded me again That Love conquered All And that we would Dance again at Such great Heights.
Cheers, Nnagh Nnagh. I'll see you later xx
