On the night after my Dad died,
I ran away into the city -
I wanted to lose myself
within the metropolis of people,
because I felt like I had lost
something inside of me...
on the night after my Dad died,
I walked the illuminated city streets
not knowing where I was going to go,
nor who I was going to meet...
on the night after my Dad died,
I felt more alone than I had ever felt in my life...
on the night after my Dad died,
I wanted to scream, I wanted to shout, I wanted to cry -
but, in all honesty, I could not control my emotions
so instead I felt numb but as if I were walking around
with a gaping wound in my chest
that exposed my bleeding heart
that felt like it had been repeatedly
stabbed by a knife.

On the night after my Dad died,
I unexpectedly met some new friends
who all already knew one another
and who had gathered together
to share a Christmas drink -
and though I had never met any of them before
I knew that there was something
to my meeting them that seemed like
someone or something wanted me
to form a brand new link...
on the night after my Dad died,
I remember being angry at whomever
or whatever had taken my Dad away from me...
on the night after my Dad died,
I could not believe what had happened, what I had seen -
and even now, and always, I will never be able to comprehend
this nightmarish new reality I am living in
that I wish was just a bad dream.

On the night after my Dad died -
after spending most of the night talking,
connecting, and intoxicated, with my new friends -
I said goodbye, and then, after I somehow made my way home,
I reflected upon what had happened
through a mirrored torrent of tears,
and I wondered what was going to happen next
and who I now was -
and though no clear answers came to me,
I knew that my world, as I knew it,
had come to an end.

My Dad is always with me -
I feel him around me, within me,
like the glow and the feeling
of some kind of perpetual spirit and light
that I know is my Dad speaking to me,
reaching out to me, guiding me,
giving me the gift of his unending love
that will always mean everything to me.

-Mark Hastings
22/12/22

In memory of my Dad,
David William George Hastings
6/1/1949 - 8/12/2022