Like a lot of people, I love the movies made by the British Production company-Working Title Films.
They’ve made dozens of films like Bridget Jones’ Diary, Notting Hill, Love Actually, About a Boy, Victoria & Abdul, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Billy Elliot, Captain Corelli’s Mandolin….
Oh, I could go on and on…they are just great films to watch.
The first time I really became aware of them though was when I saw the film Four Weddings and a Funeral.
I loved it and laughed out loud many times-but the funeral scene, well I was very disappointed in it.
I vividly remember thinking it was a bit over-the-top in it’s blackness and sombreness.
A bit too much.
A bit unnecessary.
Although I was vaguely aware of the poem that they used in that scene, it was used in such a way that it was very powerful-but again, to be absolutely honest with you dear reader, I thought it was completely over-acted and deliberately made to tug at the heart-strings of the viewer a bit too much for my liking….melodramatic-that’s the word.
Melodramatic.
Or not.
Now….when I hear that poem, every comma, full-stop, consonant and vowel is like a stab in my heart.
I get it now.
I totally get it.
It’s not melodramatic at all.
It wasn’t over-acted…it was perfectly acted.
It’s simple and it’s honest.
And it’s the truth.
I don’t want the clocks to tick.
I don’t want the stars to shine.
I haven’t played music to listen to for over two years.
I want the world to stop carrying on as normal.
Because it’s not normal anymore.
I completely empathise with this poem.
Who did he lose? WH Auden I mean…the poet.
Was it a clandestine love-affair?
Homosexuality was illegal when this poem was written, so was this his one and only chance to publicly declare his love for another man-the poem is even written in the first-person and speaks of ‘him’, making it a very personal homage to a loss.
A dreadful loss.
Or was he a witness to someone else losing somebody? And to the awfulness of it and what it did to those left behind?
You can’t write something so profound without having insider information…or personal knowledge and experience of it.
I feel so terribly sorry for him and empathise with him completely and totally, because this poem comes so very close to how I feel since losing Ross.
It’s a funny thing, but some of the words-or rather phrases-used in the poem, are very similar to some I also used once in a song called UNINVITED GUEST in which I imagined the reaction of a woman on her wedding day seeing her ex-lover turn up at the church…..”you were my wrong, my right, my night and my day”…..
I used the song in my musical SWANSEA GIRLS and as regular readers will know, Ross played guitar on stage in the show-and funnily enough, he told me this was one of his favourite songs of mine and he loved playing it-having listened to it again just now, I can hear it-he plays beautiful guitar in it, really beautiful-and of course, in the video-clip, you can also see him a couple of times, to my far left on stage.
He was my everything.
STOP ALL THE CLOCKS (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 on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe 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 for ever: 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.
W. H. Auden
Post-script:
As I finished writing this last night I had the TV on and a programme came on about the Welsh footballing legend Terry Yorath.
He tragically lost his own son suddenly when he was just 15 and a promising young footballer like his Dad. He just dropped dead in front of him as they were having a kickabout. I don’t know how you would even begin to deal with that. I didn’t have to watch Ross die. Terry desperately tried to revive his son-I didn’t have to do that.
I watched him talk about this and saw how easily he cried and thought how broken he looked.
A broken man.
I feel like a broken woman-I really do.
He spoke out loud exactly how I feel-EXACTLY.
He told how he was visited by a woman just after his son died-a stranger who had also lost her son-and she told him that although people say ‘time is a great healer’ that it’s not true, that you will NEVER get over it. Never.
And there he was, all these years later, saying she was right. I could feel myself nodding in agreement.
His brother said that he will never get over it and will never be able to move on.
It ended his marriage and he still can’t sleep-all these years later. At his son’s graveside, his face absolutely crumpled…even now, you could see and feel his agonising pain. It was overwhelming.
But you know what, dear reader, rather weirdly, I suddenly felt a sense of relief….relief that it’s NOT just me feeling like this…that other parents-not all-but some-feel exactly as I do-have the same ‘symptoms’.
What a relief-I’m not going insane.
And I’m not alone in how I feel.
I felt vindicated.
He vindicated my extreme grief for Ross for me in that brutally frank and heartbreaking thirty minute programme.
He gave me permission to feel as I do.
Thank you Terry x
UNINVITED GUEST-NIA TRUSSLER-JONES (SWANSEA GIRLS)
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A DEATH 