Farewell to a Healer

“I have some bad news,”
A relative tells you.
“I’ve just heard that Alan has died.”

What do you do
With information like that?
You stand up and you wander outside.

All of a sudden,
Nothing much matters,
As you walk the fence line in your yard.

You hadn’t seen Alan
In a lifetime of hours.
Still, to know he has vanished is hard.

A man who gave you
Permission to live
And the keys to overcome fear.

It’s just hard to believe,
That a friend such as Alan
Can somehow no longer be here.

But you look at your home
And your family within it
And know none of that ever would be,

But for Alan, who always was
So good at listening,
And he took time to listen to me.

JH

Author: Jim Hagarty

I am a 72-year-old retired journalist, busy recovering from a lifelong career as an unretired journalist. This year marks a half century of my scratching out little fables about life. My interests include genealogy, humour and music. I live in a little blue shack in Canada and spend most of my time trying to stay out of trouble. I am not that good at it. I also spent years teaching journalism. Poor state of journalism today: My fault. I have a family I don't deserve, a dog that adores me, and two cars the junk yard refuses to accept. My prized possessions include my old guitar and a razor my Dad gave me when I was 14 and which I still use when I bother to shave. Oh, and my great-great-grandfather's blackthorn stick he brought from Ireland in the 1850s. I have only one opinion but it is a good one: People take too many showers.