Funeral reading
If I Should Go Before the Rest of You
Joyce Grenfell
“If I Should Go Before the Rest of You” by Joyce Grenfell is a poem read at a funeral or memorial service. It takes about 30 seconds read aloud, usually by a guest reader. We do not reprint the words here — the note below says why, and what to bring instead.
Why the words are not printed here
Still in copyright. It is in her memoir In Pleasant Places (1979) and in the collected verse — print it from one of those. It is eight lines; give the reader the page rather than a phone.
Pieces still in copyright are listed by title and author only — we name them and tell you where to get them, but we do not reproduce the words. Public-domain text is printed in your script in full.
What it is about
The permission-not-to-be-sad poem. Wry rather than funny, and it steadies a room early on.
Read at a funeral or memorial service. Themes: if I should go before the rest of you · permission not to be sad · weep not for me but be glad · a cheerful person · a short reading to open with · gentle rather than funny.
Questions about reading it aloud
How long does “If I Should Go Before the Rest of You” take to read aloud?
“If I Should Go Before the Rest of You” takes about 30 seconds read aloud at a ceremony pace, which is slower than conversation — roughly 130 words a minute. That is the figure the run-sheet uses when it works out the timing for the whole service.
Who usually reads “If I Should Go Before the Rest of You”?
Usually a guest reader rather than the officiant. “If I Should Go Before the Rest of You” runs about 30 seconds, which is a manageable amount to hand to a friend or family member. Give them a printed copy of their own, in a size they can read without their glasses, and tell them where to stand and how you will introduce them.
Can “If I Should Go Before the Rest of You” be printed in a ceremony script?
Not by us. Still in copyright. It is in her memoir In Pleasant Places (1979) and in the collected verse — print it from one of those. It is eight lines; give the reader the page rather than a phone.
A reading is two minutes of the hour.
The rest is the welcome, the life, the remembrances, the committal — and knowing what comes next. Answer some questions about them and get the whole service, written out, with this reading in its place.
Other readings that suit the same service
- Afterglow — "I'd like the memory of me to be a happy one"30 secondsHelen Lowrie Marshall
- Remember55 secondsChristina Rossetti
- Requiem25 secondsRobert Louis Stevenson
- Crossing the Bar55 secondsAlfred, Lord Tennyson
- Invictus55 secondsWilliam Ernest Henley
- Because I could not stop for Deatha minute and a halfEmily Dickinson