“You Never Sent Me a Message Today, Dad”

It was my father’s birthday, and since he had long since passed, I went to a local church to light a candle for him. I tried to imagine his presence and asked him to send me some kind of message that day to let me know he was still there in spirit.

I went home and looked through a book of poems that I had given him on his 80th birthday. He had turned back the page on William Blake’s “The Tyger,” which begins:

“Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;”

This was meaningful to me, as I knew he particularly loved this poem. He had also written a few words of appreciation about me for giving him this book on the inside page.

I proceeded with my day and forgot all about my request of him until the evening, when I was watching an obscure movie I had chosen. The story followed a young girl in 1950s Australia who worked in a department store but secretly aspired to become a poet.

I suddenly thought of my dad and said out loud to him, “You never sent me a message today then, Dad, but don’t worry. I still love you anyway.”

Just as I said these words, the girl in the movie, who was sitting in bed, picked up a book from her bedside table, opened it and began reciting “The Tyger”: “Tyger Tyger, burning bright, / In the forests of the night…”

I felt a sense of euphoria and wonderment at this meaningful coincidence that brought my father’s presence to me. I sensed an “otherness” impossible to convey in words.

This synchronistic coincidence is one of many I have experienced and noted down in a diary I keep. My little book of wonders.