THE LEGEND OF ST. ANTHONY WAS A TRAGIC TALE.
And this legend started simply so: of a man and his walking cane in the cathedral foyer. This man was not unreasonably sized, in fact, one would say quite average. On his Cypress back there sat a medium-sized Sicilian orange, with two beady eyes stitched on.
Once, a young boy attempted to climb the back of this average-looking man, for he too had mistaken it as a plain Cypress standing lone in the narthex. Now, this young boy was the son of a knight, and was accustomed to climbing even the strangest trees. Yet, this was not a familiar tree to the young boy. He gripped onto the scraggly branches of the tree, and attempted to hoist himself up.
The boy was confounded when the tree, instead of allowing the boy to perch upon his branches, took his willowy arm and whacked the boy down. The boy tumbled to the ground, clutching his sides in despair. This tree though, merely blinked twice at the stapling on the ground, and turned the other way.
The orange-man did not spare another glance at the half-hearted attempt of the young boy. His beady eyes, like that of pumpkin seeds, soon found another contender. This time, a small pomegranate.
Here, the young boy on the ground noticed something unfamiliar about the orange-man. As the orange-man paced about the foyer, never once did the sapling see the trunk of the Cypress. Unusually, for the boy had a keen aptitude for observation, the leaves of the tree draped over his lower torso, obscuring all but the roots of the Cypress.
How odd! The boy knew he was the son of a knight, and being the son of knight meant he was privy to the few particular secrets the trees harbored: firstly, trees could not move without the wind; and two: there was no wind to be found inside the cathedral foyer.
The Cypress edged closer to the young pomegranate, his withery boughs grazing over its forehead. The boy rose to a kneeling position, fraught with terror. The older pomegranate beside the smaller was glazen with a smile, but the young boy could not watch.
The pomegranate in the arms of the older burst into tears, and yet both the orange-man and the older let out zealous screeches! Oh, how the young boy panicked. Within an instant, too quick for any to interfere, the boy snatched the metal cross and charged at the Cypress.
Now, the Cypress was a normal man the same way he was average-sized. He was such a normal man that with one swing from the might of the young boy the tree gave way. The trunk of the Cypress stood still, yet the crown of the tree began to tip… and tip… and tip… until the man at last collapsed. How… incredible? The sapling too did not know what to think.
There was a sort of stunned silence, where even the boy stood bemused. The Cypress had never swayed, the onlookers whispered, he had never been bested. He was an ethereal creation, the people once believed many years ago. But still, the eyes of the Cypress merely glazed over before at last the now-tenuous tree was felled.
Now, quite oddly to the young boy, the older pomegranate too began to wail! The tears generously rolled down its face, and the baby in her arms soon joined the fray.
“The Saint! The Saint!” The pomegranate echoed throughout the chamber, a shout so feverish and desperate that it vibrated the narthex, shaking the boy where he stood.
“The Saint! He’s dead!” The woman set the babe down on the windowsill. In a few brash steps, she gripped the collar of the young boy. His clothes, so worn and gritty, ripped under the hands of the older.
Her eyes pooled with tears while her hands shook in distress. The bystanders watched with an agape expression, the hands of which were curled into fists.
The now-enervated boy felt limp in the grasp of the woman, and he too understood that what he had brazenly done had left irreversible consequences. He did not yet know of the false narrative he had dreamed upon, but the emotions that swirled amongst the crowd left little interpretation.
“He must pay! Look what he’s done!” A man pushed his way to the front of the gathered crowd. His face was set into a stern frown, aided by the downturn of his lengthy mustache.
A dreary feeling enclosed the cathedral, especially within the young boy. His mis-matched shoes and torn-up clothes made him look particularly younger, though it had relatively minimal effect on the seething crowd.
The boy’s eyes furiously traveled the expansive room, looking for a savior. All there stood were empty faces and pugnacious promises. This was something else the boy did not know: there was no desire to save a villain from laying in his own bed.
Even so, this fact did not take long for the boy to soon understand. For there was one thing the boy did know due to his aptitude of observation: the incessant beliefs of the people could not be easily changed. The rooster knew the cage of past-comfort was now an indisputable slaughterhouse.
A strong arm yanked the young boy from the woman. He squeezed his eyes closed -- the boy was certain: This was the beginning of his end. He hung his head in shame as the mass dragged him into the town square through the crude force of their rage. The young boy now stood in solidarity, surrounded by a crowd of fanatic observers. They hollered out obscenities, muttered out curses, and spat viciously towards the center, yet the boy stood still.
He could start shivering, or perhaps start weeping, though what else could that bring? His sorrows and regret could not stop the echoing tintinnabulations from ringing through his head. Yet, if the boy sought to raise his head for the most fleeting instant, then he would see the most peculiar thing: the face of the Cypress staring right back at him.
Oh! The Cypress attempted to force his way through the crowd, as if he too had abandoned his principles. His coat hurried to follow him, thrashing against the motion.
“It was but a delusion! I order - let the boy go!” The Saint vehemently proclaimed, shoving the rioting people aside with his walking stick. His head ached of a bruise, glossing over his face from his brow to the curl of his stache. Still, the man continued on, parting the crowd with a perpetual limp in his step.
The crowd stared at this freakish occurrence, their expressions fraught with bewilderment. Be that as it may, the presence of the Saint did not stop their vicious endeavors, for their hands lacked hesitation the same way the tides kept changing. The glass cup brimmed with human anger, and slowly but surely, it began to overfill.
Chants rose into the air like glorious choir songs, pouncing the boy in the center with misery and woe. The wails of the Saint pushing through reached empty ears, and he too soon felt the crowd tightening around him. What was he to do?
It was a moment reminiscent of the previous, where one ambitious woman, to be forever unnamed, struck the boy vigorously across his temple with a battle cry that reverberated amongst the crowd.
The boy, in a scene akin to the felling of the Saint, stumbled for just a moment before crashing to his knees. The stained mask of repentance washed over the boy’s expression, quashing any inkling of childhood piety. The Saint himself joined the boy on the market floor in a desperate attempt for revival. A furious shaking resulted to no avail, for the boy still laid, defeated.
Alas, as the Saint peered down, the eyes of the boy spoke a strange and anguished tale, one that would be later canonized into history. The “Legend of St. Anthony,” they called it, as its whispers still flitter through the streets of the town. There was one important message laden in this unusual tale: the elders never speak of it, but the youngsters always seek it. It is one that the children alone must infer, when tucked neatly into beds side by side. Their eyes and mouths seek the wondrous answer, the unbridled curiosity of youth pushing their parents to reveal the sad truth, but zilch they find.
Yet on the eve of their sixteenth birthday, the child is then herded into the local cemetery, equipped with nothing but a purple hyacinth in their hands. Makeshift signs help guide the youngling through the winding path of gravestones until at last, the trail stops. In front, the child could spot a lone wooden horse. The burial site does not give any indication of its purpose to the child, though the intrigue is more than enough.
The child soon bends down before the wooden creature, their knees digging into the dirt like so many before them. There is an imprint in the dirt, appearing as if it were centuries old. On closer inspection, the horse too has nested itself, with ivory weeds constraining where it stood. The child has now discovered the truth behind the story, and begins, like the others before them, lamenting the sorrow times sowed deep in the past.
into an overgrown crevice
and now the child understands.
