The Reverend
father sprinkled water on the coffin and the words ‘I bless the body of Ifeoma
Ada Mark Anthony with the Holy Water which recalls her baptism…’ resounded in
the church hall.
I imagine
that my newly widowed friend cannot begrudge medical personnel and clergy for referring
to his adorable wife as ‘the body’. I imagine that the past twelve days have been grueling for him. I can imagine many things but I certainly cannot
imagine what he must be going through, nay, what he will go through after the requiem
and interment are over.
I sat through
the Liturgy, struggled to enjoy the melody of the sung psalms and absorb the
messages from all three readings. I marveled at the choice of the story of Mary, Martha and Lazarus for the gospel reading. This story’s high-point(for me) has
always been the calling of Lazarus back to life, but in the reading we end at
Jesus asking Martha if she believed that anyone who had faith in Him, though he
dies shall yet live. An unfair passage to read; this is what I will think later
on.
At the
Prayer of the Faithful, we are to respond ‘Open
the gate, the gate of heaven, open the gate for Ifeoma…’ And I send prayers
that she may awaken light, unburdened by earthly worries. A prayer which indeed
is a prayer for myself as well, when the time comes.
Determined
not to shed a tear, I walk out of St Agnes with heavy eyes, as the choir sang ‘God be with you, till we meet again’
She was
beautiful. She was a model when we were in school and beyond rocking clothes
that flattered her table-flat tummy, she was a kindhearted person. Everyone agreed
to this one fact, and to the fact that she had a smile for everyone and a sharp
but playful retort for close friends.
Walking to
the graveside, we joked about this.
Sunny P
said he would miss the way she teased him with ‘Oni gbese!’ whenever they saw
or spoke on the phone. He said his singular regret since they both became designers
was that he had put off one of her requests for too long. He had promised to
teach her how to sew trousers and had been postponing till the inevitable
happened.
‘Shey na
tomorrow I wan come teach am the trouser?’ he said, half lamenting, half
clowning.
‘So, like
say you don teach am to sew trouser, she for dey sew trouser for dat side abi?’
I asked him in turn and hit him playfully on his mildly protruding occiput. We
laughed, and Richystar joined us. We probably cut a strange picture in a cemetery
but in that instant, I knew the reflex was a welcome diversion from the matter
at hand.
I planned
to be stoic, to not shed tears for a friend I had only spoken to once in the
last year. When the undertakers approached the coffin after the prayers, the sniffs
and wails went up in the air like sand dunes in a desert, but I kept my eyes on the coffin. I
made out her siblings crying and my heart went out to them. When Tunde collected
the shovel, I sensed his strength and my resolve melt into the shovel as he
dropped the sand, and in that melting, the tears flowed freely on his cheeks;
mine too. It was only just beginning to sink in.
He was led away from
the graveside, and I stood impotent as my tear ducts burst a dam. Sunny P’s hand
rubbing my back did nothing for the dam, and minutes later as my eyes trailed
Tunde’s heart wrenching lament for his lovely wife, I saw Sunny P struggling
with his own tears.
 |
| Ifeoma Ada Mark Anthony |
My friend
is too young to be widowed less than three years after their wedding. But can
one really question death? I listened to him blame himself for allowing her go
on that trip, and I stretched my hand to hold his- me outside the window, him
inside an SUV where he was flanked by men, both of them our former course mates.
I told him he wasn’t to blame. But these words and the others said in
consolation will only make sense later. Only after the grief has taken its
sometimes tormenting course will the pain lessen.
Till then, I
do pray that Ifeoma is in a good place, willing Tunde the strength to live on
as we pray and wish her the strength to also move on. Celine Dion was right;
Goodbye is the saddest word…
