Love and trustLove and trust
By Brandon Astor Jones
"I never saw a man who looked/ With such a wistful eye/ Upon that little tent of blue/ Which prisoners call the sky." — Oscar Wilde, from The Ballad of Reading Gaol.
She was especially fond of certain passages from Oscar Wilde's The Ballad of Reading Gaol. It was as if she thought of prisons, and those of us being held in them, as huge uncultivated fields in need only of a gentle hand to stimulate our growth.
The first time I read that work, she sent it to me. She was a near-perfect picture of health, then. That was long before she was informed about the terminal nature of her cancer. I remember how sad she became and how quickly that sadness turned to joy when, after cutting it out, her doctors pronounced her "cured".
Alas, she was not cured. Our wonderful sister and friend died on March 7.
It was my intention to write something usual about her, but there was nothing usual about her. Yet merely to say that she was unusual would be the height of understatement. She was the kind of woman who would go out of her way for others. She tried to bring joy into every life she touched — and she touched many.
I was going to write at some length exclusively about her, but she was modest and would not have approved of that. She would like me to write about the sitters, who sat by her bedside while she used the last of her strength in her struggle against death.
She spoke nostalgically, for hours on end, of the people, places and things that had shaped her life, while Glenys Alderton, day after day, listened and gently held her hand. Like I did, Glenys felt privileged to be counted in her long list of friends. Thank you, Glenys; I sat with you both in spirit.
To the very end, she treated us all to a gentle, caring kindness and wisdom not easily found these days, anywhere.
She had a way of loving almost everyone she met, instantly. Her love was so real and pure that one easily got the feeling that she grew her own, and tended it with incessant diligence, in her back yard.
One of her favourite places was Lion Island. Glenys tells me that she asked that she be present on the day that her ashes were strewn on the waters there. If any of you find yourselves sailing those waters, her spirit will be helping you to get to where you want to go. I see no reason to believe that death could change her helping spirit.
My friend and brother, Stephen Langford, also sat with her and read "a couple of poems". He shared one with us, "Remember" by Christina Rossetti: "Remember me when I am gone away/ ... Yet if you should forget me for a while/ ... Better by far you should forget and smile/ Than that you should remember and be sad."
Stephen went on to write, "She has done so much real good, started so many humane things going that I could not imagine remembering and being sad — except at her passing".
Gone from us but still causing us to think with her love of poetry: it is strange how one person can change the thoughts of so many.
I know men who spent their spare time in prison making knives before she entered their lives, who now make words that lift — instead of bleed — the hearts of other men and women.
I never wrote a poem exclusively for her while she lived, despite the fact that she was my muse for many poems. With that admission, I send the following out to the eternal waters that surround Lion Island, from Reidsville jail, in loving memory of Stephanie Wilkinson, my friend and sister. We who loved you here (and in many other places and prisons) bid you this loving farewell. You will forever be
The Gardener
The indomitable spirit that in life never slept
not even now, in death
Not a mouthing-Christian, but a real sowing Christian
Others' hurts she would dust, till, thresh and
gladly accept
With an overt compassion always near, never piously distant
Like a gentle sun hanging low, radiating warmth bringing
on love's softest hues
To fields vast with hate, she plowed incessantly
despite her pains, too selfless to complain
or even make the slightest fuss
She really lived her preach, to humanely treat, and nourish
those of us society has chosen to lose
No matter the nature, colour or condition of our
respective soil, in it, she only planted
seeds of love and trust.
[The writer is a prisoner in the United States. He welcomes letters commenting on his columns. He can be written to at: Brandon Astor Jones, Georgia State Prison, HCO1, Reidsville, GA 30453, USA. For the first time in 17 years, Brandon has the real hope of his sentence of death being mitigated. If you can help by contributing to his defence fund or in other ways, please contact Australians Against Executions, PO Box 640, Milson's Point NSW 2061. Phone (02) 9955 1731, fax 9427 9489. Cheques can be made payable to "Brandon Astor Jones Defence Fund".]