The Funeral of Mark Cecil

[RiverNotch]

The punctuation and capitalization of the piece is a mess. I couldn't take this as seriously, even as the satire it seems to be, with the carelessness, which I have, according to my style, corrected below (so you should really pursue your own corrections) --- especially with the stench of vanity. I mean, I suppose most grand poetry is vain, and vain to a great extent, but this ------- I'll try and explain.

First, the title. The author dropping his own name (or perhaps his avatar's name) already feels like an order of magnitude more vain than the rest. "The Funeral of Mark Cecil" -- to me, it implies some grand parade, or perhaps some grand cause of death, that's specific to the author, rather than to a persona vague enough ("My Funeral" should be enough, even if you use your name later on) to be adapted by the reader.

To him his death would be of world renown:
all peoples of the earth would mourn his passing.
Many would rush to come and pay their respects,
especially the people of France. But not considering the title, no, this is show of vanity isn't yet egregious....

For he saw himself as a Frenchman
and thought earnestly that he would be compared
to many great men of that nation, men like:
Descartes, Pascal, Sartre and Voltaire. It's here that the eye-twitch returns, if only because the greatness here feels....I dunno. Elitist? I mean, sure, the point is they're French, so I can't really shake off Eurocentrism, but these figures are all boring old white dudes. Why not exciting dudes like Robespierre, or young dudes like Rimbaud, or black dudes like Dumas, or not-dudes like de Beauvoir? And there's also the stench of Great Man theory here, which really doesn't sit well -- when Whitman compared himself to "great men", he had empathy enough to recognize greatness in everyone, such that his poem seemed expansive, compared to this.

Many in Paris who said “je suis Charlie” And then here, the problem is magnified. "Je suis Charlie" was, at least according to my understanding, a protest against extremism and for free speech -- the oppression there was far more immediate than anything the poem discusses. The reference here at best feels misapplied, especially without any talk of murder or controversy throughout, and at worst feels like the speaker is diluting the central issue of the protest.
would say in time “je suis Mark Cecil",
deceased the second February, 
two thousand and fifteen in Craigavon.

But his death and funeral never took place:
no masked and armed men came to kill him, I mean, sure, you do reference the fact that it was an undue comparison, but the issue runs sort of deeper than that. For one, as far as I know, no masked extremists went and murdered Voltaire, Descartes, etc. -- for another, this ignores the elements of extremism and free speech inherent in the Charlie Hebdo case. Sure, it was a violent death, but that's about all there is in common with what the speaker seems to reach out for here, especially since Charlie Hebdo wasn't a particularly insightful magazine (not that it deserved what happened to it, mind you), already courting controversy among more reasonable circles long before the shooting. This really isn't enough -- in fact, if you really want to go with the whole comparison, you should probably move the direct reference to Charlie Hebdo down, because it really leaves a strong enough taste to spoil the rest.
no mourning tears were shed at his passing,
no funeral with a coffin was laid to rest.

For on that fateful day his mind perished,
making him follow the ways of the beasts,
descending him into the grave of madness
with the isolation unit his coffin. And the rest....I dunno. There's something very flat about this stanza. How did his mind perish? How did he follow the ways of the beasts? "descending him into the grave of madness" -- I mean, besides the fact that descending is an INtransitive verb, it feels quite cliche.

His family shed no tears for they were absent.
Only strange undertakers were present
who rather than bury the deceased
resurrected him from his great folly. And really, what folly? The folly of the poem -- again, the starting bits left a really bad taste in the mouth. The folly of the mind perishing -- how? That would probably make for a far more interesting piece, than this. I suppose in the end my issue really isn't the seeming vanity of the piece, but more the really, really terrible comparison with Charlie Hebdo that, sure, is acknowledged to be false, but is not acknowledged with enough depth or grace and is perhaps acknowledged a little too late to stop it from dominating the piece.