Warning Funeral Poem
By Jenny Joseph
This poem tells about the things she wants to wear and how she wants to behave in old age. For now, she must live the life of expected sobriety but, when she reaches old age she is determined to let respectability fly to the wind. The lady thinks about her old age days.
Warning Poem Lyrics
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick flowers in other people’s gardens
And learn to spit You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes. But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers. But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.
| Poem Title | Warning Poem |
| Poem Writer / Author | Jenny Joseph |
| Publisher | CSouvenir Press |
| Warning Poem Lyrics Printable | LYRICS PDF (for printing) LYRICS WORD DOC |