The death of fun: reminiscing on the suicide of Hunter S. Thompson

isaac macdougall
Contributor

“No sympathy for the devil; keep that
in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride – and
if it occasionally gets a little heavier
than what you had in mind, well – maybe
chalk it off to forced conscious expansion:
tune in, freak out, get beaten.”
— Hunter S. Thompson

To die a death unfit for such a prince,
But oh! to live a life so wildly remiss!
In each word writ, the life of such flow’d forth,
And with such life, the pleasure of one’s youth.
But cold and dark amongst his years of thought,
The joys of this: one final ticket bought.

The years so pil’d on our sweet poet’s head,
A generation of contemporaries dead,
And yet, our sweet ren’gade liv’d a life on par,
With which he wrote; a life of guttered star.
And finally, to all of us advised,
After ticket bought, take this, his final ride.
For us to ride, our outlaw poet did succ?r,
Tormented Angel , law of riders so abhorred.
And thee, of all my influences, have remain’d
To me, the spark of such a sparkling life ungain’d.
And in his mind, climactic chances to expand,
Did lead his conscious heart to force his heartless hand.
And in his final vigilante act we see
The final truth of this, his reverie;
A chance to quit this too-long world by will,
By choice, with choice of time, and place and final thrill.
No sympathy for him, ever deign we to bestow,
And to him and Him, the Devil, bid our outlaw poet go.