"The public is wonderfully tolerant. It forgives everything except genius."
-- Oscar Wilde

Last year on my birthday, I had a few things to say about Oscar Wilde. After all, we share the same birthday, just about 120 years removed from each other. We share seemingly the same penchant for questioning society, social norms, prevailing values, and views, and the socio-political, and economic systems that dominate our lives. We share self-examination as a means of finding where we can change

"Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic."
-- Oscar Wilde

Tragedy drives creation. So much art is created through pain, heartache, loss, and the need to rise again from the ashes of disasters.

I love his quotes. I love how he examined, and built his perspectives on life, and the world he existed in. Admittedly, I've never studied Oscar Wilde in depth. I know of his works. I know bits, and parts of his work. I really do need to set aside time to become more familiar with his writings. However, his poetry. Oh, his poetry. I feel connected to it. Much like T.S. Eliot's works, Wilde's poems reach within me in ways I can't explain. Written in jagged rhythms, and unwieldy prose, his analogies, and metaphors spill like a sweet dessert wine from the lips when spoken aloud. 

And not to say this in a braggadocios way, but they remind me of my own. Earthly images of sea, land, and life, creating characters out of the elements, and dissecting the tiny details so many of us often miss.

"THE wild bee reels from bough to bough
With his furry coat and his gauzy wing.
Now in a lily-cup, and now
Setting a jacinth bell a-swing,
In his wandering;
Sit closer love: it was here I trow
I made that vow"

-- Her Voice

"Nay, if it be thy will I shall endure,
And sell ambition at the common mart, 
And let dull failure be my vestiture,
And sorrow dig its grave within my heart."

-- Apologia

"O blossom that hangs in the tremulous air!
O blossom with lips of snow!
Come down, come down, for my love to wear!
You will die on her head in a crown,
You will die in a fold of her gown,
To her little light heart you will go!
O blossom that hangs in the tremulous air!
O blossom with lips of snow! "

-- Under the Balcony

He uses words more elegantly than I do, but wrote in the eloquence of the Victorian era. I fall short, as I often see when I compare my writing to that of legendary writers. But so many images of love, and images of honoring the one whom you love. How the world can break under the weight of sorrow, but is a pain that is worth owning if only for the moments of love, and the risk spent in having love, and embracing the moments.

"Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead."
-- Oscar Wilde

"It is better to be beautiful than to be good. But... it is better to be good than to be ugly."
-- Oscar Wilde

I love. I try to keep love alive, and exciting. And I self-reflect, evaluate, and examine my every act, my every word, my every intention, in an effort to be the best person I can be.

Maybe I do that because I know I'll never be beautiful to anyone.

As opposed to a state of being
My perfection is a fluid thing
A destination that is never reached
Without the agreement of her heart
But without it, there is no start
No fire to warm, no blood to boil
Just more expectation of toil
Independence only found in space
Proximity causes no heart to race
No warming touch, no lips caress
No bared skin to chase the mess
Try as I may, I will never quite reach
Without the agreement of her heart
So how do I start?
Between self-perception, and the outside view
Of how you see me, when I give all to you

-- Me

"The world is a stage, but the play is badly cast."
-- Oscar Wilde

And sometimes I don't even know what role I'm supposed to play here.