For Jean-Pierre Adams - The Fever Called Living Is Conquered At Last

After 39 years in a coma, Senegalese born Jean-Pierre Adams a legend of French football (soccer) has passed on. He went into a coma, in 1982 during knee surgery, the coma having been caused by errors by the anesthetist and a trainee (who was basically left in charge of the anesthesia and who reportedly later admitted it was too much for him to handle).

When I read the story it immediately brought Edgar Allan Poe's poem - For Annie - to my mind:

For Annie

By Edgar Allan Poe

Thank Heaven! the crisis,

The danger, is past,

And the lingering illness

Is over at last—

And the fever called "Living"

Is conquered at last.

Sadly, I know

I am shorn of my strength,

And no muscle I move

As I lie at full length—

But no matter!—I feel

I am better at length.

And I rest so composedly,

Now, in my bed,

That any beholder

Might fancy me dead—

Might start at beholding me,

Thinking me dead.

The moaning and groaning,

The sighing and sobbing,

Are quieted now,

With that horrible throbbing

At heart:—ah, that horrible,

Horrible throbbing!

The sickness—the nausea—

The pitiless pain—

Have ceased, with the fever

That maddened my brain—

With the fever called "Living"

That burned in my brain.

And oh! of all tortures

That torture the worst

Has abated—the terrible

Torture of thirst

For the naphthaline river

Of Passion accurst:—

I have drank of a water

That quenches all thirst:—

Of a water that flows,

With a lullaby sound,

From a spring but a very few

Feet under ground—

From a cavern not very far

Down under ground.

And ah! let it never

Be foolishly said

That my room it is gloomy

And narrow my bed;

For man never slept

In a different bed—

And, to sleep, you must slumber

In just such a bed.

My tantalized spirit

Here blandly reposes,

Forgetting, or never

Regretting, its roses—

Its old agitations

Of myrtles and roses:

For now, while so quietly

Lying, it fancies

A holier odor

About it, of pansies—

A rosemary odor,

Commingled with pansies—

With rue and the beautiful

Puritan pansies.

And so it lies happily,

Bathing in many

A dream of the truth

And the beauty of Annie—

Drowned in a bath

Of the tresses of Annie.

She tenderly kissed me,

She fondly caressed,

And then I fell gently

To sleep on her breast—

Deeply to sleep

From the heaven of her breast.

When the light was extinguished,

She covered me warm,

And she prayed to the angels

To keep me from harm—

To the queen of the angels

To shield me from harm.

And I lie so composedly,

Now, in my bed,

(Knowing her love)

That you fancy me dead—

And I rest so contentedly,

Now in my bed

(With her love at my breast).

That you fancy me dead—

That you shudder to look at me,

Thinking me dead:—

But my heart it is brighter

Than all of the many

Stars in the sky,

For it sparkles with Annie—

It glows with the light

Of the love of my Annie—

With the thought of the light

Of the eyes of my Annie. 

For those 39 years that Jean-Pierre Adams was in a comatose state, his wife Bernadette devotedly took care of him with love, affection, tenderness and tenacity. She never gave up hope. More at the source. 

 

Bernadette Adams - like Annie (or the woman on whom Annie was based) who was so very special to Poe's protagonist or actually to Poe himself - must obviously have been one very special woman to Jean-Pierre. If you read the entire linked article, you will have noted that Jean-Pierre's nurses reported, despite his being in a brain-dead comatose state, Jean-Pierre had slight mood changes on those rare days when his beloved Bernadette was not there with him. While it may not have the same rhyming ring to it, substitute the name Bernadette for Annie in the last stanza (or even in every stanza) of Poe's poem and that may well explain how those mood changes were possible - even for a man in a deep vegetative coma! 

 

My condolences I offer to her for her loss after having endured such long term battle which - all the while, no doubt - she hoped to see turn out otherwise. I also give my sincere respect to her for the unfailing love she gave to him for virtually four decades. She truly must be an amazing woman and was a devoted and loving wife.

All the best,

Glenn B