Let Me Die a Youngman's Death -- Roger McGough

(Poem #1627) Let Me Die a Youngman's Death Let me die a youngman's death not a clean and inbetween the sheets holywater death not a famous-last-words peaceful out of breath death When I'm 73 and in constant good tumour may I be mown down at dawn by a bright red sports car on my way home from an allnight party Or when I'm 91 with silver hair and sitting in a barber's chair may rival gangsters with hamfisted tommyguns burst in and give me a short back and insides Or when I'm 104 and banned from the Cavern may my mistress catching me in bed with her daughter and fearing for her son cut me up into little pieces and throw away every piece but one Let me die a youngman's death not a free from sin tiptoe in candle wax and waning death not a curtains drawn by angels borne 'what a nice way to go' death -- Roger McGough

We've run a couple of McGough's more humorous poems in the past, but we were
long overdue for a serious one. And, despite the superficially light tone,
this is indeed a serious poem, comparable in spirit if not in tone to Dylan
Thomas's "Do Not Go Gentle".

Which is not to say it doesn't have its absurdist side - this may be a
serious poem, but it is not a solemn one, and the way the humour plays off
against the darker tone is one of its particular strengths. (Who but McGough
could have come up with the phrase 'in constant good tumour'?) It's a
refreshing change from the "unconquerable soul" tone of most poems I've read
on the topic - it is easy to picture the narrator as a living, breathing
reprobate who fears a sanitised death far more than he fears death itself.

The poem also delivers a somewhat bitter commentary on the roles into which
society slots the old - another topic which McGough's gritty narrative voice
makes a perfect medium to convey. (I suspect Bert Baxter, from the Adrian
Mole books, would have loved it, for instance).

martin