Funeral blues by w h auden

The poet calls for the clocks to be stopped, the telephone to be cut off, and the dog and pianos silenced. He incorrectly thought their love would last forever. In this form the last two stanzas were not included, and three others followed instead. Here it had been rewritten as a cabaret song to fit with the kind of burlesque reviews popular in Berlin, and it was intended for Hedli Anderson in a piece by Benjamin Britten. The poem in the format readers usually see it today is a dirge, or a lament for the dead. Its tone is much more somber than early iterations, and the themes more universal, although it speaks of an individual.

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 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. Add to list. 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.

Considering that it's such a short poem, Auden 's poem "Funeral Blues" has a pretty complicated history. Auden first wrote it in as part of The Ascent of F6, a play that he co-wrote with Christopher Isherwood. In the play, the poem was satirical , which means that it was snarky, mocking, and overblown. It poked fun at a dead politician, which is maybe not so classy, but something we're all guilty of now and then. Then, in , Auden reworked the poem and turned it into a no-longer-satirical cabaret with the help of a guy named Benjamin Britten, who wrote the music.

An early version was published in , but the poem in its final, familiar form was first published in The Year's Poetry London, The first, and less widely known, version of the poem, written and published in , has five stanzas; the final version has four. Only the first two stanzas are the same in both versions.