Coffee Mourning - Remembering Lesley Chapman

 

"…I looked up the term 'memory' in a dictionary today.  Hamlet, of course, is the ultimate source for image of memory, with its haunting refrain of "Remember me." I found that to remember is not only to bring back, or present again to the mind, but, also, to reward with a gift. Surely, my memories are one of the greatest gifts I've been given…so, to remember is not only to reward with a gift—it is a gift in itself…"

 

"…The synonyms for always were endlessness, illimitability, timeless, boundless, and two words that resonate especially for me: constant and stay. The Russian writer Turgenev writes, "…you and I are like mushrooms growing in a hollow tree. Here we sit side by side without budging. But I shall stay with you forever and unalterably, just as you will stay with me." Browning writes, "grow old with me/The best is yet to be." So often, we have relationships with people and, in a very brief period, we say we "know" them, when we really know very little about them at all—our connection is small and ungrounded. Imagine how well you would know someone sharing a connection with that person for thousands of years! … How close is it possible to get?"

 

                Excerpts of a letter from Lesley Chapman to John Strain dated 10 January 1990, regarding their unfinished collaborative piece, "Always."

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Shuffling through some old letters, I wandered into a coffee shop this morning, that I might find the strength to compose a reminiscence befitting the loss of my friend, Lesley Chapman. 

While in that café, searching through memories and those letters, I traveled back to a time, a time when Lesley and I were planning a piece about re-incarnation—about the ever-lasting life of the soul.  (Lesley preferred 'Transmigration' to 'Reincarnation.')

In those years of our collaboration (1989-1991), Lesley and I were quite close, so much so for our brief acquaintance, we began to entertain a tantalizing "What If:" What if she and I had met before? Based on that premise, could we create a piece of theatre to express the sense of longing  that might be felt by a couple continually pursuing each other through time and space?

Exploring the poetry of Shakespeare, Byron, and Hopkins; invoking the plays of Beckett and Pinter; scouring the prose of Hawthorne, Strieber, and Melville (Lesley especially adored Melville!); we began a plan which, alas, never saw fruition—until this morning.

For, as I sat in that cafe, trying to apply some balm to both my writing and my heart, as I tried, definitively, to embody the essence of Lesley Chapman, I gazed into a nearby bookshelf within which I saw - quite to my amazement - a collection of poetry by Herman Melville.

I opened that book, I poured through it, (thinking myself a superstitious fool as I did!), hoping to find some "sign" that Lesley had intended me to uncover. I found no such sign, neither hidden note nor scribble. However, I did find a poem, "Pontoosuce," which, I suspect, Lesley was familiar with, and from which, below, I quote. 

Per the spirit of our unfinished theatrical piece, and per the power of Lesley's spirit, I choose to think that Melville's work was "sent" as both a comfort and a reminder that our once cherished collaboration--and our ever-cherished friendship--is not now concluded.

Rather, our friendship (and the friendships she shared with so many others) still thrives upon this earth through memories, and through the ever-lasting life of the soul.

 

"...Who sighs that all dies?"

 

Summer and winter, and pleasure and pain

And everything everywhere in God's reign,

They end, and anon they begin again:

Wane and wax, wax and wane:

Over and over and over amain

End, ever end, and begin again—

End, ever end, and forever and ever begin again."

 

She ceased and nearer slid, and hung

In dewy guise; then softlier sung:

"Since light and shade are equal set

And all revolves, no more ye know;

Ah, why should tears that pale cheek fret

For aught that waneth here below.

Let go, let go!"

 

 With that, her warm lips thrilled me through,

She kissed me, while her caplet cold

Its rootlets brushed against my brow

With all their humid clinging mould.

She vanished, leaving fragrant breath,

And warmth and chill of wedded life and death.

 

 

 

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