Meet Maggie

Each and every day we take the time to speak to friends to see how they are doing in life. Each and


Every day we walk passed fine folks that look a little different to us. Each and every day we walk passed

People who look as though they have not bathed or eaten in days. Their hands are out to us for help

and we ignore them and feel justified in doing so. The truth is we look down on this community. We do so without knowing what has happened to get the person there. In previous lives, they could have been someone who had a lapse in judgment or was dealt a playing card that sent them there. It cannot be said that homeless people want to live they way they do.



I did the same until a couple of things did happen to make me realize that these fine folks that we look down on are human beings just like the rest of us.



I came across a story of a homeless person that was a little different than most once you found out about the person. This person was characterized as close to being insane. She would shout obscenities down the street and most would say that there was a mental illness involved that made her very scary to approach. This was the opinion of us who chose not to get to her this person but just walk by.



Turns out that this is the story of this person. Maggie was born to us in the forties. She started experiencing differences in her personality in the late fifties during the already rough teen years. She was the daughter of a mercenary priest and once this difference started to fester itself, Maggie was shipped off to other members of her family and lived as a transient in the sixties. Instead of correctly finding out what may be wrong, her father said that she was a sinner and that was what was wrong with her.



In the early seventies, she took to the living on the streets after a series of events that would make most of us give up. She was finally properly diagnosed with a mental disorder and the hospital that she was in constantly performed what was known as electro shock treatment on her to fix the issue we will say. In other words sent electricity into her brain. We should also mention that she was given medication to also assist in this. Then the largest betrayal of all. This was also being done when it was discovered that she was pregnant in order for her to miscarry the child. Once this child was actually born and Maggie demonstrated how tough she actually was, the child was put up for adoption or correctly said, taken away from her. That was the turning point for Maggie and she walked out in to the streets of Hamilton until she passed away in the mid nineties being ignored y all of us.



You would think her story would end there but it does not. Maggie was profiled many times once her death occurred and the community that ignored her had several candlelight vigils and memorials in her name. A headstone was donated in order for anyone to remember her by two ordinary citizens. Maggie’s passing affected many people and her legacy on this earth so not completely there.



Maggie’s name was used in a proposal to implement a program called COAST in Hamilton. This program assisted families in this region on how to handle living with a person with a mental disease. It gave not only law enforcement but counseling services and consumers groups. All of this after Maggie had left us.



I think of this story and ask myself, would we be able to accomplish as much and even after death have such a positive impact as a person that we just walked by and ignored.



This lady’s life had affected me so much that this was written about her and I hope to give you more details about Maggie one day.



Maggie’s Piano



Maggie has seen days that have been better

Now she is held together by the old stitches of a tattered dress

Her gibberish screams at passerby’s make her seem sinister

She cannot keep it all calm and together, Maggie’s mind is a mess



Maggie’s magic happened each night before we settled in

She would sit, smile and give a gift like no tomorrow

Touching us all before she would really begin

The mystical, magical sound of Maggie’s Piano



Every day her eyes looked so worn

Head down and tired when she takes a dirty seat

Scattered worries race through her mind, so forlorn

Maggie cannot figure out when next she will eat



Each day, Maggie helped our homeless strive

Lifting our wandering sorrow

Touching us to come alive

By the sweet sound of Maggie’s Piano



People walk by Maggie with her hands out

Street cratered face. Years of street and alley living

As they went by, she gave an angry, unrecognizable shout

One that sent them away from giving



When most of our bodies felt like death

Sweet sounds gave us smiles for tomorrow

That on extra, smooth breath

From the heart of Maggie’s Piano



We were so sad when Maggie left

Gone, to us, was that fighting courage

To the rest of us, it was the higher power’s theft

Tired of watching her get kicked like every day garbage

So he took her to a better place

Where maybe her clothes were sparkled new

Where there was no more anger in her face

Where weathered skin could be new



Each night, we close our eyes

Listening for her grace

Gifts from the skies

To the battered piano in this place

How it takes away our tired and cold

A warm, safe place to go

For the warm, unkempt and old

At the foot of the always playing Maggie’s Piano



October 31, 2009