There's alot of pain in this poem. I'm not trying to do what so many did after Harrison's death on November 29th, 2002, which was to try and "claim" him for our generation. Clearly, I couldn't be, seeing as I wrote this almost a month before the news broke. I'm also not trying to re-invent the guy, which became a cottage industry in the weeks after the announcement. For all the explanations & enunciations of his place in the Beatles, his strengths as a songwriter, composer, & guitarist, nothing ever explained away the alchemy of the music or the absurdity of the unabashed fan frenzy for anything the Beatles did (with the exception of The White Album). The band was simultaneous more and less than the sum of the parts, & George fit so oddly in the band, yet somehow he fit. He was capable of being bitter, and he was, clearly, and often. He was capable of being full of himself, and very often he was. He was also a great musician, guitarist, songwriter, and tried hard to be a fine human being in general, and did a much better job than alot of celebrites one might name. I think what I was after was-- check that, is-- some kind of reconciliation with the fact that the man was going to die, sooner or later, and the fact that I was completely in denial about it. I had heard of the Doc in NY, and I knew that he was famous for famously sick people coming to him as a last resort & then dying anyways.

So if this sounds like hero-worship, it's not. Think of this for a moment: there was alot about the Beatles that was pure shell-game, absolutley side-show sham, and George, poor, honest George, knew it, and sometimes he could hardly bear it, and he wore that on his face. And THAT's why he was "The Quiet One." If he'd opened his mouth, what often would have come out would be something along the lines of "OH, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD! IT'S ALL JUST AN ACT!"

And they couldn't have had that then, could they? If he knew that Allred bitch was flagging around trying to drum up a lawsuit over the fact that they disguised his whereabouts on the day of his death so that the family could have a little peace, he'd be livid. (Or, at least, as livid as Harrison ever got.)

George Harrison died on November 29th, 2001. And there wasn't a damned thing anyone could do about it. And, legend has it, he went out with a smile.