The song for my father
My father died on Christmas Day, 2025. In the weeks after, I couldn't find the words any other way — so I wrote them into a song. It was made for one person, and it turned out to be something a lot of people quietly needed.
This is the song, exactly as it was written. It is the standard every commission is held to.
A sample of the writing
The closing stanzas of a memorial poem, written as a sample for a fictional subject — a grandfather who fished. Every commissioned piece is built this way: from one true detail a family gives us, never from a template.
Now every grey-gold morning brings you back —
the flask, the salt, the gulls that knew your name,
the way you’d hum some half-remembered tune,
the small returning tide of you again.
So I won’t say you’re gone. I’ll say the tide.
I’ll say you slipped your mooring, soft and slow,
and left your hand still folded over mine
to hold the line — and Grandad, I still row.
Written for a fictional subject, so no family's words are ever shown without them. The full piece travels with our introduction letter — and every real commission stays private to the family it belongs to.
Commission your own
Your memories, written into lyrics by hand and set to music. Delivered within days, ready for the service or for keeping.
The words for the hardest day, written to a short, gentle brief — so no one has to stand up unprepared.
If you'd rather talk it through first, or you're a funeral director or celebrant with a family in mind: hello@sonderlume.com