The Visit
The Visit.
An Elderly woman sits alone while all about her is ragged, worn and in disarray- it is as if she has lived this way for so long, she hardly notices. Even she is dishevelled. She has received a letter and has been informed she will soon receive a visitor, an old friend, a past comrade- a sister in arms, Maria.
Although she looks forward to the visit, she has now suddenly noticed the conditions of both herself and her home. She looks forward to receiving Maria and re-living old memories they share but knows it will also open old wounds.
Oh! How I once stood tall and proud in my smart uniform: a symbol of liberation and hope,
A new future, a new order: our stomachs empty but our hearts full to bursting,
Now I am to be honoured with a comrade a person known to me since my youth who stood beside me in our struggles,
How changed she will find me.
I can see decay here within these old walls- even my mirror reflects only dust and my chairs are threadbare,
Yet, together we witnessed worse, degradation, such sights- so maybe she will forgive me these conditions.
Oh! How once we all talked of victory of celebrations and plentiful plates- for all,
Such talk- but what will she see when she looks upon me after so many years- will she see reflections of the girl I once was? Of the girls we both once were? Or, will she see me aged- lost of all glory, I cannot bare it- but weariness holds me, and efforts are lost.
I see now how the plaster has fallen in piles upon the dusty floor- this house holds no colour, no brightness, such as me.
Shall I cover these threadbare chairs? Make them as new again? – as we once fought to make new our Motherland- so long ago,
Will we recall by name those who were lost? Their names elude me- yet, I see their faces and their broken bodies,
Maybe we will talk of the years after our parting; our incarceration: I heard she married well and bore children: what can I tell her of my empty years- how my coat remained hung in the hallway and I never heard the cries of my children: my marriage bed empty and the sheets uncrumpled.
Maria, she has known a man of her own choosing, her own free will- how can I burden her with my sacrifice: my pain: my shame: my disgrace?
My purity lost by our captors for their own enjoyment- this was my humiliation: must she know how I took myself away from others never seeking love or safety in the arms of any man?
I smell the decay here like seaweed that has been left on the sand under a hot sun,
Strong coffee will mask it: maybe I will take a short walk to the grocery store and let a light breeze renew my clothes: or open a window onto the world to allow new air in.
I had a dress once- it hangs I think still in my wardrobe: I never wore it- on my return I did not consider myself worthy of its fine threads: If I had taken myself out in that dress would any man have admired the fine lace? Now it is grey with age- like me.
Beside it hangs my blood-stained uniform- dirty from the shame.
No, I will rest here and await my visitor.
The old woman receives her visitor- a young woman who is the granddaughter of her old friend, if she had read the letter closely- she would have known it was not Maria who would visit- yet, she chose not to.
The young woman is called Anna and she comes out of respect and her grandmothers last wishes for her to do so, she has come with old photographs together with Maria’s old uniform- so clean and neatly boxed. (she is moved by this gesture and thinks she will hang it in place of her own).
Anna takes her grandmothers old friend outside into the sunshine and talks of her grandmothers last years in Athens- it all sounds like a fairy tale and she tries not to laugh).
When it is time for Anna to leave the old woman thanks her for taking the trouble to visit and sits alone again on her old armchair looking out of the window to watch Anna walk until she has disappeared from view.
Alone the old woman grows weary and with a slight breeze cooling her from the open window she soon falls asleep- a sleep from which she will never awake- she is carried by a guiding light to the heavens and to safety. Now she is again reunited with Maria and together they are washed clean by the Mother.
Julie Achilles/2019
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