Where do the immortal go when everything and everyone we love has deserted us? When we’re ready to stop being a body and to be nothing but a soul?
Bram. London. April. 1981.
I should never have promised Oliver that this year would be better than the last. A promise is a dare. To fate. To the gods. To whatever force controls the brutal dance of life. A promise is a fragile thing waiting to be broken. Mine has been broken day by day. Week by week. Month by terrible month. Oliver has finally agreed to Lily’s suggestion that he talk to a professional. Finding the right therapist has been hard. His melancholy days seem to be more frequent. He goes through days where he doesn’t play any music. That’s how I know he’s in a dark spell. When he closes the door on the one thing that always gives him hope.
“I know not whether laws be right.” My thirteen-year-old student recites the poem he’s studying Friday afternoon in the park. “Or whether laws be wrong. All that we know who lie in...”
“Gaol.” I know the poem by heart. Of course. I know much of Wilde’s work by heart.
“What is gaol?”
“It means jail. Wilde wrote this poem when he was released from prison.”
“I asked Mother why Oscar Wilde was put in jail, and she said I would find out when I was old enough to understand.”
“You’re fourteen.” I look into his adolescent eyes. So full of curiosity. Yearning. “You were old enough to ask me to teach you some of Wilde’s work.”
He looks at me slyly. “Truth be told, I asked about Wilde because my literature professor said I should avoid him at all costs. Said I should stick to Shakespeare and Dickens. I figured it was because his writing was obscene. Didn’t expect an endless poem about prison.”
I nod. “Let’s dig into the poem some more.”
“Why wouldn’t he just say jail or prison? Why use a word likegaol?”
The thing I love most about tutoring is the questions. The way they remind me that I too am full of questions. Curiosity keeps me going. Persistence too. My persistence is something I cherish. A badge of honor. It’s what got me here. Curiosity and persistence. And the ability to laugh ateverything. These are the qualities that keep me alive. I’d be merely existing without them.
“Was it common back then in... when did he write this?”
“1898.”
“Fuck me, that’s a long time ago.” I love when the students swear in front of me. It means I’ve gained their trust. That they’re willing to be themselves in my presence.
“Not so long, in the grand scheme of things. Not even a century.”
Wilde had been released from prison by then. A bon vivant no more. The era of green carnations had passed. The witticisms that once delighted this city gave way to cheerless verses. His words dried up as he drank himself into a stupor. Loneliness. Meningitis. An acute ear infection. He who had a talent for hearing whatothers were hiding could hear no more. He died too young. Too broken. Perhaps—among the many things he taught us—this is the most important one: that all beauty must fade.
“Gaolis a word of Irish origin. As Wilde is of Irish origin. Perhaps he chose the word to tell us something.”
I wait patiently. Watch the wheels in this intelligent boy’s head turn. “My father says the Irish are greedy and ungrateful.”
“Mmm.” I don’t dare say more. I need jobs like these. I cock my head toward the book in his hand. “Keep reading. Better yet, close the book and try to recite from memory.”
He closes the book. “All that we know who lie in gaol is that the wall is strong. And that each day is like a year. A year whose days are long.” He glances nervously at me. “I haven’t memorized the rest.”
“You still have time.” I glance at my watch. “Let’s wrap up now. The sun is shining, and it’s Poet’s Day. Go have some fun. Next time, we’ll focus on your Latin studies again.”
“Why must we learn Latin when nobody speaks it any longer?”
I shrug. “That’s a question for your classics professor, but I suppose it’s so you might comprehend the etymology of your language. If we don’t study the source of our way of thinking and communicating, then we can never understand why we are the way we are.”
“Latin is boring.” He laughs. I do too. “What’s Poet’s Day?”
I smile. “Piss off early, tomorrow’s Saturday.”
“What?”
“Think about it.”
He thinks. Laughs. Delight in his young eyes. The world all future for him. Nothing but revelation and possibility. “Let’s piss off, then.”
