The Apparition
By Tim Giago (Nanwica Kciji – Stands Up For Them)
This poem was written by Tim Giago in 1974.
I want to speak but I cannot and the face is becoming hazy in the crowd. I say “Wait… do not leave yet…stay and talk awhile.”
The apparition does not leave but approaches ever closer and says, “There is fear in my heart, and sorrow, for I have wandered long and suddenly the path ends. But what has brought me here and caused our paths to join? When I heard your voice calling to me from the darkness why did I respond? If this haze that surrounds me would clear, then perhaps I would know.
“But there is such a thing as fate,” say I, “that causes a life to cross the path of another, to suddenly appear in the pushing and crushing throng of a thousand spirits? For an instant I could have turned my head or blinked my eyes and missed your face in that milling crowd, never to be seen again, leaving only the tide of the unfamiliar, the alien… floating past like clouds, a glimpse of blue, a patch of red, joining the million faces that intermingle in the parade of time.”
I have been like a log rolling down a roaring river snagging on a low hanging branch, swept again by the powerful currents, brushing along the banks of life. My bark has been torn and scarred by the countless obstacles but I have always found friendly waves that guided me through narrow channels and kept me from being smashed to bits against the jagged rocks.”
“Such has been my lot,” said the spirit, “ and now we are in a large lagoon where the water is peaceful, the sky is blue, and I wish to stay awhile; but so long have I wandered that I find myself searching for excuses, looking beyond to the hills for a brighter sunrise when I know there is none.
Early patterns are hard to change and the memories that haunt me are many. But I must ask myself why I cannot, this once, trust in one who has wandered as I.”
We did not turn our heads or blink our eyes. Instead we joined hands and stood before each other with fear, with doubts; nonetheless, we did not pass.
“Perhaps what you ask is so. Perhaps there is a force that guides us in our lives and at last brings us to a crossroads where our paths must meet.”
The apparition is no longer obscured by the haze, the features are clear. And as I peer into her eyes a picture from my childhood flickers from the dungeons of long forgotten memories, seen through the eyes of the innocent, of a youthful dreamer, seen before the lies of a thousand voices had stilled the curiosity of the young, before the hands of a thousand thieves had torn the treasures of wide-eyed wonder from the heart of innocence, seen before the brutality of politics, the bloodshed of wars, the depravation of society and the inhumanity of mankind had snatched the comforts of God from my heart.
The picture is in a book of catechism. The page is worn and dog-eared from grubby hands. I looked at each day of the year and marveled at the beauty of the portrait. The face is the same as the apparition before me. It is the face that I loved as a child, that comforted me in fear and gave me happiness in sorrow. I close my eyes to see the name printed in the style of long ago…it says simply “The Little Flower”.
The apparition said, “Let us stay for awhile and see what we shall see…let fate decide the future.”
Contact Tim Giago at najournalist1@gmail.com
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