Funeral reading
Gone From My Sight — the ship
Attributed to Luther F. Beecher; widely printed as Henry Van Dyke
“Gone From My Sight — the ship” (attributed to Luther F. Beecher; widely printed as Henry Van Dyke) is a prose reading read at a funeral or memorial service. It takes about a minute and a half read aloud, usually by the officiant. It is in the public domain, so the full text is printed on this page and goes straight into a ceremony script.
The full text
I am standing upon the seashore. A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze, and starts for the blue ocean. She is an object of beauty and strength, and I stand and watch her until she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky come down to meet and mingle with each other. Then someone at my side says: "There! She's gone!" Gone where? Gone from my sight — that is all. She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side, and just as able to bear her load of living freight to the place of her destination. Her diminished size is in me and not in her. And just at that moment when someone at my side says: "There! She's gone!" there are other eyes that are watching for her coming, and other voices ready to take up the glad shout: "Here she comes!"
Public domain, so these words can be printed in a ceremony script or an order of service.
Where it comes from
At least three publications credited the piece to the Rev. Luther F. Beecher in printings shortly after his death, and the Henry Van Dyke credit spread through Barbara Karnes’s hospice booklet of the same name, according to the Wikipedia history of Gone From My Sight.
What it says
A person stands on the shore watching a sailing ship leave in the morning wind. She gets smaller and smaller until she is a speck where sea and sky meet, and someone says, “There, she’s gone.” The speaker answers: gone where? Only out of sight. The ship is as big as she ever was and still carrying her cargo; the shrinking is in the watcher’s eyes, not in the ship. And at the moment one voice says she has gone, other voices on a far shore are calling out that she is arriving.
The ship one, used constantly in hospice work. Reads well in a plain voice. Read at a funeral or memorial service. Themes: a ship sailing over the horizon · gone from my sight is not gone · short · a sailor · hospice · a gentle death.
Who it suits
Hospice families and anyone who sat with a person through their last days, since it is the reading hospice staff know best. It suits a gentle, expected death and a family who believe the person has gone somewhere, without needing that place named. Sailors, fishermen and anyone who loved the coast make it feel chosen rather than borrowed. It also works at a service with several faiths in the room, because it never mentions God.
Where it goes in the ceremony
Usually one of the earlier readings, or the last words before the committal or the curtain at a crematorium. The officiant often reads it, because it is short and plain and the image is easy to hold for a minute.
Reading it aloud
The text on this page is 164 words. At a ceremony pace of about 130 words a minute, which is slower than conversation, that comes to about a minute and a half of reading.
- It is prose and it moves slowly. Let the opening paragraph take its time; the room needs to see the ship before you take it away.
- Give the two lines of dialogue (“There! She’s gone!” and “Here she comes!”) a slightly different voice from the narration, but do not shout either of them.
- “Her diminished size is in me and not in her” is the turn. Pause before it and after it.
- If the person who died was a man, keep “she”: the ship is the she, not the person.
Questions about reading it aloud
How long does “Gone From My Sight — the ship” take to read aloud?
“Gone From My Sight — the ship” takes about a minute and a half 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 “Gone From My Sight — the ship”?
Usually the officiant rather than a guest reader. “Gone From My Sight — the ship” runs about a minute and a half, which sits inside the part of the service the officiant is already leading, and keeping it there means it is carried by the person who has rehearsed it.
Can “Gone From My Sight — the ship” be printed in a ceremony script?
Yes. It is in the public domain, so the full text is on this page and can be printed in a script or an order of service.
Where this text was checked
Wording confirmed through a reputable secondary source that reproduces someone else’s transcription. Due a check against a primary edition.
Checked
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
- Crossing the Bar55 secondsDeath as a voyage out over the sandbar, in verse
- Death Is Nothing At Alltwo minutesAnother plain prose reassurance that the person is near
- Requiem30 secondsA sailor coming home rather than setting out
- No Man Is an Island (Meditation XVII)40 secondsJohn Donne
- On Death, from The Prophet55 secondsKahlil Gibran
- The Body of B. Franklin, Printer — his own mock epitaph30 secondsBenjamin Franklin