03 Apr Could This Be Him?
WWII Veteran Herman F. Allen, Columbia, SC. Feb. 25, 2011 ~ 94 years old
For most of his life, Herman Allen has written poetry. The earliest poems I have are from the late 1930’s and then the war years, the 1940’s. After he came back to the states and started his family, there wasn’t time to write. Five children, supporting a wife and children, the Reserves, community service. When he started to write again is when he got a computer in the 1990’s.
I’m driving to Columbia, South Carolina in the morning to spend a week with him. More than likely, Herman will be going into the hospital to see if the doctors can get his medications under control. He is struggling. It’s getting harder and harder for him to walk. Slowly, slowly, slowly with a cane. In the three years he has been in Assisted Living, he has never participated in the group activities because he just can’t hear well enough.
It’s harder and harder to process his thoughts, to make sense of his world. And he knows it.
A couple months ago, his granddaughter Meagen, a graduate student at Amherst, spent the day with Herman. She wrote, “I was sitting with him and doing research for my paper. He had been singing to himself for an hour. I stopped reading and starting writing down everything he sang – I think this is his new poetry …”
I was sitting by the fireplace
Gazing into the flames
When I saw a shadow walk within the door
And I knew it was someone I’d never known before.
So I arose and took the handle and
Asked him to come in.
As he entered I looked at him
And thought to myself
Could this be him?
Could this be him?
Could this be the man I’ve been waiting for?
Could this be him? I don’t know.
But maybe we’ll find out
Before he leaves.
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