I don't want you to go

Brigid has lost her brother.  Her sendoff is what you'd expect, and I expect that the Ferryboat Man will take that in lieu of the expected obol.  And make change.

I missed him. I remember walking in the woods with Dad's old Savage and seeing an elk crash into flight from a stand of small trees, the sound curving around the whole earth it seemed. I couldn't move, frozen by the sound. I simply stood, open mouthed, gun at my side, incredulous as to how big he really was close up and all the thoughts flowing through my head, turning to follow his now invisible running. For lack of any other response to his leaving, I picked up a rock and threw it hard and deep into the forest in which he ran, the stone, glinting like a knife, disappearing into the last copper ray of sun before it dipped behind the trees.


"I don't want you to go" was all I could say, as I stood there in the fading light, sounding very small and alone.

But while I never knew him nor him me, her words remind us of the common community in which we find ourselves.

No man is an island,
Entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thy friend's
Or of thine own were:
Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind,
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee. 

- John Donne

Our community is diminished, because Brigid shares with us that which is precious.  The bell tolls for all of us.