I don't know how to explain. I can't explain. Maybe I don't even want to. Maybe I don't even have to.
It was strangely difficult for me to put a few lines about Costion on paper. Maybe I shouldn't say it, maybe I should have said something else. But I couldn't manage to say that 'something else'...
My thought now doesn't go towards the man in flesh and blood from before he passed on, but towards a Costion – just as present, but in a different way – after his passing.
He kept writing somewhere that „friendship is not only about those with whom you spend time in this life. You can feel a friend to those who have departed, through their deeds whose echo has harmoniously rippled through your being. Living and dead, we meet on the same Eucharistic commemoration list; only a fragment (truly!) of time separates us, and what does that matter on the scale of eternity? It matters enormously, and it doesn't matter at all.”
„...a friend to those who have departed, through their deeds whose echo has harmoniously rippled through your being... ”. Well, but there are also deeds from after they left! I have experienced this feeling before with some deeds of Father Arsenie Papacioc (after he passed away)!
I met Costion Nicolescu in 1991, when Doina Bâscă invited him to create, together with Maria, his wife, a Christian spirituality supplement: „Alpha and Omega”, for Ion Rațiu's „Cotidianul”. I retained the memory of a wonderful man, like other dear people. Very cultured, very intelligent, very devout, very thoughtful with his friends...
In his last years of life, I had a strange feeling. A revelation, I would say. I had lost sight of him for a long period and had kept the best and most serene memories. After our reunion, I realized, in a unique way, that he wasn't quite like other friends.
He gave me the feeling that I had looked at him too closely before, without actually seeing him as he was. Like seeing the slope of the mountain we're climbing, without seeing the mountain itself.
We reconnected because I asked him to present my first volume of poems at its launch. A year and a half later, he also invited me to be among those who presented his last volume of essays („When Eternity Descends to Earth”) at its launch. Very beautiful and erudite texts about celebration and holidays, full of spirit, written over more than thirty years. I had read some of them. But I hadn't noticed that all his essays are, beyond what they appear to be, poetry.
I believe he was the greatest lover of poetry I've ever known. I'm not exaggerating. I would say that any normal person loves poetry, because poetry is one of the essences of man. But I don't think I've seen as much love for poetry in anyone else. Maria told me that it was mainly through poetry (Ioan Alexandru, first and foremost) that Costion came to faith. And Costion became, throughout his life, Poetry.
Costion was a handsome man. Beyond that, he was an extraordinary lover of beauty. Costion became, throughout his life, Beauty.
Costion loved love and friendship. He became, throughout his life, Love and Friendship. For all his friends, Costion was a celebration. And he made them feel like his own celebrations too.
Costion loved God and the saints. And now I will say: in recent years, for several of his friends, Costion has become a saint!
At his forty-day memorial service, I was at the table with Anca Stanciu and Cosmina Dragomir, two of his friends who had also become my friends. With great fear of being judged for exaggeration, I told them that I believe Costion was a saint. Anca looked at me very serenely and replied: „I think you're the fifth person to tell me that!”
On that occasion, I asked Cosmina to illustrate the volume of poems that I intended to dedicate to Costion, even before I knew he would pass away. He was the only one to whom I had dedicated four poems. He was the one who had enjoyed the dedicated poems the most!
I asked both of them to present the volume at the launch, in Costion's place. Moreover, for Costion, Cosmina created some wonderful paintings, which entered into a dialogue with the poems. Without any financial claims, even though she was struggling financially. For me, on the other hand, it was a period with expenses greater than my income. However, I was expecting to receive some royalties from somewhere, so I allowed myself to order a number of paintings from Cosmina (besides those she had given me as a gift) and I hung them on the wall. I bought them, but the money I was expecting never came.
A few months after Costion's departure from us (in body) and about a month after the volume's launch, Maria called me: „Listen, are you able to receive something without protesting and without making stupid comments?” „Yes. I think I am,” I replied. „Why do you ask?” „Give me your bank account number. I thought of sending you some money, as a memorial offering for Costion”. I gave her the account number, and the next day I received exactly the money I had given Cosmina. Through Maria, Costion had bought Cosmina's paintings, which illustrated the volume dedicated to him, and which I had hung on the wall!
This was the first miracle Costion performed for me from beyond. However, it is not fitting for me to recount the other two, which were greater than this one.
So I'll say no more, but let a poem written for Costion speak about him.
Thermodynamics
To Costion
As time passes
Wrinkles appear on our faces,
And physical strength wanes.
Thought is not bold enough
For us to be able to give,
Every time,
More than we receive,
So that time
Flows backward
And triumphs,
Even in this life,
Entropy.
But the soul grows
Every day,
Until its delicacy
Conquers the cowardice of thought
And heals time
From itself.
Then we celebrate on the same day
Easter and Christmas!
Șerban Madgearu