suicide
by Chesterton · Cluster: Joy · Animals · Comic Verse Song
Abstract
A comic ballade whose refrain (‘I think I will not hang myself to-day’) turns the contemplation of death into a celebration of life’s small wonders.
Testo / Text
Connections
Historical References: French Revolution
Motifs: Gallows
Topoi: Carpe Diem Themes & Concepts: Mortality, Joy, Wonder and Gratitude, Satire of Society, Despair, Suicide Forms & Genres: Ballad Ballade, Lyric, Comic Verse Song
Testo integrale / Full text
A Ballade of Suicide
The gallows in my garden, people say,
Is new and neat and adequately tall;
I tie the noose on in a knowing way
As one that knots his necktie for a ball;
But just as all the neighbours—on the wall—
Are drawing a long breath to shout “Hurray!”
The strangest whim has seized me… . After all
I think I will not hang myself to-day.
To-morrow is the time I get my pay—
My uncle’s sword is hanging in the hall—
I see a little cloud all pink and grey—
Perhaps the Rector’s mother will NOT call—
I fancy that I heard from Mr. Gall
That mushrooms could be cooked another way—
I never read the works of Juvenal—
I think I will not hang myself to-day.
The world will have another washing-day;
The decadents decay; the pedants pall;
And H.G. Wells has found that children play,
And Bernard Shaw discovered that they squall;
Rationalists are growing rational—
And through thick woods one finds a stream astray,
So secret that the very sky seems small—
I think I will not hang myself to-day.
ENVOI
Prince, I can hear the trumpet of Germinal,
The tumbrils toiling up the terrible way;
Even to-day your royal head may fall—
I think I will not hang myself to-day.
— G.K. Chesterton