Why would Michael Priestly, the department chair, suddenly abdicate his position on her tenure committee? After all the to-do he'd made over the Dovinger, it just didn't make sense. A number of possibilities came to mind, laziness among them, although the explanation Willard offered wasn't one of them. Michael's specialty might be Victorian literature, but as department chair, he kept abreast of both modern poetry and current approaches to the teaching of writing. Besides, Michael suffered from the arrogance of most professors. She doubted he'd ever admit to a lack of expertise, regardless of how appalling his inadequacy might be. No, there was definitely something else going on.
Bess Seymour appeared in the office just then. She was one of the faculty Deirdre had liked from their first meeting and felt inclined to trust. At a conservative institution like Northwest University, Bess was openly feminist and a lesbian. While the faculty might argue the virtues of recognizing diversity, most of them made sure they fit a conventional mode—at least on the outside. Bess lived her convictions.
"Congratulations on the Dovinger, Deirdre," Bess said, "I know it hasn't been officially announced yet, but we thrive on rumors in the English department."
"Thanks, Bess."
"You don't look very happy, though. What's up?"
"Just an early encounter with Freemont Willard," Deirdre grumbled.
Bess snorted. "Is that vile piece of vomitous garbage around today? Where's the oil slick?"
Deirdre glanced over her shoulder. "Can you think of any reason Michael would ask Freemont to take his place on my review committee all of a sudden?" she asked.
"Michael asked him?"
"Freemont claims that Michael felt insecure about reviewing someone in my field."
"Michael, insecure?" Bess gave a brief laugh. "It certainly doesn't keep him from pontificating on everything from Austen to Zolà. Besides, he's been sitting on review committees for the past fifteen years here, and most of them outside his field."
"That's what I thought," Deirdre muttered. She remembered Freemont's leering smile, and felt as if she had stepped on a slug barefoot. The urge to curl her toes was almost overwhelming.
Bess took a moment to sort through her mail, tossing most of it in the recycle basket as she did so. "We need to have lunch sometime, Deirdre," she said when she looked up again. "Soon. The sooner the better, in fact. I've been wanting to talk to you anyway—and now seems now is a very good time all of a damn sudden."
"All right," Deirdre answered slowly. Although she liked Bess, they weren't close and had never socialized. She wondered at this sudden, unprecedented invitation. "Any hints?"
She shook her head. "Let's just make sure it's well off campus—all right?"
Her tone of voice made Deirdre glance over her shoulder. "How about tomorrow?"
Bess nodded. "I'll meet you at Dmitri's at one tomorrow. We'll have a late lunch." She leaned closer and whispered, "Prepare yourself for filth—I'm going to tell you some secrets.”
VIII.
When Deirdre returned to her office, the morning's conversations with Freemont and Bess buzzed around her head like persistent mosquitoes. Worse than buzzing, though, she felt as if she'd been bitten as well .Their hints itched like bites gone bad and scratching didn't help. Neither of them had said much, but the comments of both were similarly laced with dark, nasty hints.
At least their mysterious innuendoes had taken her mind off yesterday's misadventures. Now, it was time to go to class.
"An Introduction to Poetry Writing" was mainly attended by sophomores with a scattering of juniors who still needed to get their fine arts requirement out of the way. Only a few of them were English majors. It was her favorite class. The poetry these students wrote tended to be fresher and much less pretentious than that of the creative writing majors who took her advanced seminar. They were also far more open to suggestion and criticism.
Even though most professors considered the class a write-off, one that could be taught with little or no preparation, Deirdre felt more strongly about it. Poetry had been her salvation. Not that her verse had ever been beautiful or uplifting. It was, in fact, the opposite—a clear reflection, for those who could read between the lines, of the hell that had once been her life. That's why she wanted to stay at the university. To transmute the past and salvage the future. Like a literary social worker, she wanted to open the way for other victims of life's cruel vagaries.
As her students filed into the classroom, good-natured jocks, mascara'd goths, prom queens, and outcasts, she wondered what horrors their fresh faces might mask. The statistics on child abuse alone, physical, mental and sexual, indicated that at least half of them were dealing with their own private demons. Did any of them guess that her assignments were specifically designed as therapy? Probably not. People who suffered rarely understood that they were not alone. Worse, many of them probably thought they themselves were to blame for their troubles. It was still early in the term, so she had not yet introduced those writing exercises designed to tap the depths of one's psyche, but today seemed a good time to begin.
"I know this is a writing class," she began once they were seated, "but today we're going to start by drawing."
A groan went up followed by whispers of, "I can't draw a straight line."
"Don't worry about your expertise,” she went on. “You're the only one who's going to see it besides me. This is just an exercise to tap the other side of your brain. You'll be surprised at what comes up if you give this a chance."
She looked around the room. Most faces were glued on hers, but two or three looked down at their notebooks. "I want you to think back to your past, to when you were a child." A few more began looking out the window.
"I want you to think of the things that scared you."
"Why are we doing this?" a girl in the back row asked. Mattie Berringer was ordinarily agreeable and docile, but now her voice sounded rebellious, even angry.
"Poetry can't always be about hearts and flowers," Deirdre replied evenly. For a moment, she wondered if perhaps there was someone here with worse scars than her own. It was a cruel world. Still, it would be hard to go back now. If Mattie didn't want to participate, she didn't have to.
"All I ask is that you give this a chance. If it doesn't work for you, try another approach. Just make sure you end by writing a poem."
Deirdre took a breath and went on, "The symbols we use in our writing reflect both the light and the dark of our souls. Now, let's take a minute before we begin. Does anyone have a memory they don't mind sharing?"
After a moment, a football player up front raised a paw. "It sounds totally stupid now," he said with a grin, "but when I was a kid, I used to think the neighbor lady was a witch."
Scattered laughter rippled across the room. "Why'd you think that, Scott?" someone asked. "Did she have gingerbread dudes in the garden?"
Scott blushed but went on, "I don't know about that, but her cookies tasted like dog biscuits. She tried to be nice, I think, but she lived in a creepy house, and the older kids in the neighborhood told me she ate cats and put spells on little kids. They showed me a bunch of cat food cans in her garbage and said she used the food to lure the cats into her backyard. She was probably just poor and was eating cat food, but, boy! At the time, I kept out of her way."
"That's the kind of thing I mean," Deirdre said. "So Scott could draw a picture of his neighbor or her house. Anyone else?"
Several hands went up. "Hey, Scott," one of the other football players piped up, "I've got you beat for stupid! You know how conservative my parents are? Well, when I was little I was afraid that democrats were going to break into the house at night."
The class laughed and Deirdre with them.
"Yeah," he continued, "I didn't even know what a democrat was, but I heard my mom and dad talk about them like they were from the Dawn of the Dead, so I guess that explains it."
"So does he have to draw a picture of the Governor?" another student asked.
"Well,"
Deirdre hedged, "that's up to Brett. But I think you all have the idea now. Draw your pictures and when you're done, I want you to list the words and phrases that your picture brings to mind. Later, we'll talk about arranging the words into lines of poetry."
The impromptu poetry exercise went well, Deirdre thought as she looked over the poems that had been turned in at the end of class. Now that she had taught for almost three years, she was no longer surprised when accident proved more powerful than design.
Mattie's poem was interesting, as she'd anticipated it might be:
Pup howls away the night as
full moon smiles warnings:
Watch for hands that steal dreams,
Watch out yourself, Oh pretty one!
The rest was scratched out, almost violently it seemed. Deirdre wasn't sure what to make of it, but the staccato rhythm hinted at something hiding beneath the surface which might come out some day. She hoped it was for the best. She had to believe it would be—but only if something could be done to stop the nightmares before they began.
By the time she had finished reading through the drafts, Deirdre had only an hour to prepare for the advanced poetry seminar. She usually began class by reading a short poem to the class and talking about it for a few moments. She had been planning on someone nice and sane like Carl Sandburg, but now he didn't seem right anymore. She leaned back in her chair and scanned the bookshelves. Frost, Hopkins, Eliot, Kumin, Keizer…Dickinson. Yes.
Part of what bothered her about Freemont Willard was his insistence on referring to her as the department's "little Emily Dickinson." His insinuation that women poets were sweet little fluffs to be petted and disregarded made her sick. There was nothing sweet or fluffy about herself—or Emily Dickinson, for that matter—despite outward prettiness. Perhaps it should be Dickinson for class this afternoon, then. One of her poems with some gut. She leafed through the anthology:
My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun –
In Corners – till a Day
The Owner passed – identified –
And carried Me away –
That was it, she decided immediately. She scanned the lines, remembering their power, remembering the first time she had read Dickinson’s poetry on her own without the guiding influence of a teacher. It was raw passion. Regret. Fearless disregard for the expected.
Though I than He – may longer live
He longer must – than I –
For I have but the power to kill,
Without – the power to die –
Yes, this was definitely the poem.
Later, as she read the verses to her class, she felt the tension of the poem creep into her voice. Although there were only twelve students enrolled in the seminar, the university, with its legendary inefficiency, had assigned the class to a lecture hall that seated fifty. The seats were bolted to the floor, contributing to a sense of rigidity that clashed with the free flow of ideas she hoped to foster. Each class had its particular chemistry, and this one had been destined from the start to be awkward.
When she finished reading, the class sat silent, looking at her. They'd clearly been in too many classes where the professor had interpreted the meaning for them. In spite of only having taught one other class thus far today, she felt drained by the stress of the last twenty-four hours. She hoped she wouldn't have to drag a discussion out of this group.
"What did you notice about this poem?" she asked after a moment passed. "Anyone?"
They responded with still more silence. The waiting game had started. Deirdre took a seat at her desk. Say something, she willed them. Say anything.
Several were whispering to one another. One or two were exchanging glances. Todd Hall, a tall, athletic blond was staring right at her, though, with his "you'll give in before I do" smirk. She might have described him as handsome, but his cold Aryan looks reminded her too forcefully of a member of Hitler Youth. She had once overheard a giggling pair of smitten admirers describe him as "studly." She supposed that meant that when he walked, he led from the pelvis. His writing, too, seemed to generate from that region. His poems were blatantly phallic.
The seconds ticked by. Finally, the door flew open and Adam Watts rushed in, wool poncho askew, his curling hair an uncombed mop. Adam was disorganization personified. Scraps of paper always seemed to follow him in a swirling cloud as they dropped from his pockets and notebooks. He reminded Deirdre a little of herself. She liked him and his poetry.
Adam stopped in his tracks and looked around the silent group. "What are we supposed to be doing?" he whispered loudly to the closest student.
"We're supposed to be having a discussion," Deirdre told him. "Can't you tell?"
He started to answer, then stopped himself.
"Actually, Adam," Deirdre went on, rescuing him from the awkward moment, "I just finished reading a Dickinson poem and was waiting for a response to it." She handed him a copy.
He looked at it and nodded. "I really love this poem. I read it for the first time a long time ago, but I keep coming back to it."
"Why do you suppose that is?" Deirdre asked, relieved that the silence had been broken.
Adam shrugged. "I guess because it's so sad without being sappy. When I write something sad, I always feel like I'm saying 'gee, feel sorry for me.' This poem doesn't do that."
"That's bullshit," Todd broke in. Like a bad actor, he seemed to make a conscious effort to insert contempt in his tone. "The poem's about sex, but Dickinson was such a repressed piece of dried up New England, such a Puritan, she probably didn't even know it."
Deirdre stifled a sigh. In some ways she preferred her class to be silent. "What do you mean, Todd?"
"I mean the little virgin of Amherst wanted it pretty bad. She was dying for it."
"I assume you mean she wanted sex," she said, keeping her voice carefully neutral.
Adam turned to Todd. "You're reading a lot into this, aren't you?"
"Sorry to spoil the patron saint of poetry for you, Adam, but it's there in black and white. 'A loaded gun' – it's a penis."
"But she's talking about her life," another student put in tentatively. "At least, I think….”
"Right," Todd went on, "the gun's loaded—it's never been fired. She's a virgin poetess."
"You're mixing your metaphors," a girl next to him snapped. "The gun can't be both her virginity and a penis. Make up your mind."
The discussion carried itself along after that and Deirdre let it play itself out. By the time the class drew to a close, a number of factions had asserted themselves, none of whose interpretations, Deirdre was forced to admit, would have borne close critical examination.
She could have asserted herself more, injected the voice of reason, but she felt too exhausted. Last night's lack of sleep must be catching up with her. She could not afford this sort of performance when Freemont Willard observed her class. Again, she felt a nagging apprehension as she thought of him. Bess Seymour's words came back to her: prepare yourself for filth – I’m going to tell you some secrets.
"Interesting discussion," Deirdre told her students at last, breaking in on their comments. "Let's take the last few minutes and write. You can either say something about the way the discussion went or spin off a quick poem of your own. When you're done, just hand it in and you can leave."
They wrote silently for the next several minutes. Todd Hall wrote only a few lines, then he leaned back in his chair, watching as his classmates began to file out.
"You're finished, aren't you, Todd?" she asked when only he remained.
He raised out of his chair with a slow smile and strolled toward her, then dropped his paper on the pile with the rest.
"Have a nice evening, Deirdre," he said as he sauntered out of the room.
Deirdre encouraged students to call her by her first name, but there was something in Todd's tone, something both intimate and offensive, that made her wish he called her "professor." She glanced down at his paper. He had merely reasserted what he had
already said during class. In the margin, though, he had sketched something almost like one of Georgia O'Keefe's flower paintings. A second later, she realized it was a poor attempt at depicting the female genitalia.
Creep! she thought. Students who sexually harassed professors were fairly rare, but not unknown. She'd be tempted to file a complaint against him if he were a better artist. Just as with Freemont, though, she’d have to bite her tongue and bide her time. There were ways of making people regret their actions that had nothing to do with policy, ways that would not bring her any unwanted attention.
Deirdre gathered the sheaf of papers from the desk and put them in her satchel without looking at them further. She glanced at her watch. It was a little after five o'clock and she wanted to get to the bus stop before it got too dark. The long walk from the humanities building along a dimly lit series of paths made her a little uneasy under the best of circumstances. Tonight, it felt downright reckless.
Except for her lunch with Bess, she wasn't planning to be on campus tomorrow. She'd just stop by her office to check her voice mail, then be on her way. It was usually best to make sure that no new committee meetings had been scheduled. Attending those meetings was the dreariest part of her job, but they were required and would be part of her review. She couldn't afford to miss one, not now. Maybe she was being paranoid, but she wouldn't put it past Freemont to schedule something without telling her, just to keep her off balance.
Deirdre turned the key in the lock and opened her office door.
"Burning the midnight oil, Emily?"
She jumped, then turned to see Freemont leaning in his doorway across the hall from her. Speak of the devil, she thought, then shuddered.
"I didn't mean to startle you. I didn't know you'd be here so late. Meeting someone?"
She ignored his question and asked one of her own. "When will you be observing my class?" It sounded abrupt and awkward to her, even a little rude.
"I don't really know, my dear," Freemont replied as if nonplused. "I thought I'd just pop in sometime." He paused and gave her a slow smile. "I like surprises. Don't you?"
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