He noted that first came the date of birth and spoke of the following date with tears, but said what mattered most of all was the dash between those years.įor that dash represents all the time they spent alive on earth and now only those who loved them know what that little line is worth.įor it matters not, how much we own, the cars.the house.the cash. He referred to the dates on the tombstone from the beginning.to the end. I read of a man who stood to speak at a funeral of a friend. The poem makes you think about how you spend your dash and when your eulogy is being read, will you be proud of how you spent your dash? - THE DASH - by Linda Ellis We make note of the year that the person was born and the year they died, which really say nothing, when it’s more about what’s between those dates, the dash, which represent the years of that person’s life. The poem is based on the simple idea of how we view a tombstone, an obituary or death notice. The poem makes you think about how you spend your dash and when your eulogy is being read, will you be proud of how you spent your dash? It's by Linda Ellis and it's called The Dash, and it's available as an A4 print from my site here. I heard Chris Evans talking about the eloquence of this beautiful and very moving poem on the radio this morning.

Make the most of your dash poem