# Nonreligious words/speech at a funeral **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 4, 2012, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nonreligious-words-speech-at-a-funeral/633689 "2012-09-04T22:37:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 2\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Dead\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9fc29f/32.png) [@Dead\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dead_Cat)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2012, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nonreligious-words-speech-at-a-funeral/633689/21 "2012-09-05T12:02:24Z")
At my grandfather’s funeral I wrote and read out a simple poem about my memories of him. It was a mixture of the serious and the lighthearted, and went down really well. But as others have said, don’t feel you have to write a poem, prose is fine - and it can be as short or as long (within reason!) as you want. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2012, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nonreligious-words-speech-at-a-funeral/633689/22 "2012-09-05T12:30:44Z")
How about the Book of Ecclesiastes? That’s always a crowd-pleaser. - I saw that wisdom is better than folly, just as light is better than darkness. The wise have eyes in their heads, while the fool walks in the darkness; but I came to realize that the same fate overtakes them both. Then I said to myself, “The fate of the fool will overtake me also. What then do I gain by being wise?” I said to myself, “This too is meaningless.” For the wise, like the fool, will not be long remembered; the days have already come when both have been forgotten. Like the fool, the wise too must die!\* [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nonreligious-words-speech-at-a-funeral/633689.md?page=1)