Alfred de Grazia dies
(Dec. 29, 1919 - July 13, 2014)
Pity the Mourners
Pity the mourners, not the dead.
Mourning is worse than dying.
Calculating the sadness and tears,
the forlorn reaching for the dead,
I hardly dare to die. It would be
an imposition upon friend and family.
But they ought esteem more the
trouble I take to outlive them,
to keep them happy and chattering
about my faults:
"What silly thing will he do next?"
(Short of dying, of course,
than which nothing is worse
save the mourning that follows.)
Alfred de Grazia
From: Twentieth-Century Firesale
