Vaհe Apelian
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| Bedros Tourian's gravesite, Judge Frank Caprio, author Eric Bobosian, poet Bedros Tourian |
I read that Judge Frank Caprio first revealed his cancer diagnosis in late 2023. He told his viewers he was undergoing treatment in Rhode Island and Boston. True to character, he remained open and optimistic throughout the journey, often sharing updates and thanking his supporters for their encouragement.
Even in his final hours, he did just that. He recorded a short but emotional Instagram video from his hospital bed, asking followers to keep him in their thoughts. He said from his hospital bed: “Last year I asked you to pray for me, and it’s very obvious that you did, because I came through a very difficult period,” Caprio said in the clip. “Unfortunately, I’ve had a setback. I’m back in the hospital. Now, I’m coming to you again and asking you to remember me in your prayers once more.”
Judge Caprio’s last recording from his hospital bed asking to be remembered reminded me of the last passage of Eric Bogosian’s book “Operation Nemesis”. The last paragraph, writing from my recollection, had nothing to do with Soghomon Tehlirian and of the “Operation Nemesis”. It may be that his last paragraph had more to do with his grandfather who fired his imagination. The “Operation Nemesis” book took seven years of his life to write and it was his gift to his grandfather. He concluded he conclude the book saying, I quote:
“We come into this world with nothing and we leave with nothing. We all know, either implicitly or explicitly, that all we really have is our place in the memories of others. We exist to the degree that we know and remember one another; even the most isolated among us. We share a collective understanding that we are all part of a greater whole”.
Judge Caprio’s last recording from his hospital bed asking to be remembered also reminded me of the young Armenian poet Bedros Tourian (1.6.1851 – 2.2.1872), who died at the age of 21. He reflected on his dying in his poem title “My Death”. In the last paragraph of the poem (read the poem below), he wrote:
But when my grave forgotten shall remain
In some dim nook, neglected and passed by,
When from the world my memory fades away,
That is the time when I indeed shall die!
Bedros Tourian was also a playwright and had the plays he wrote staged, but he remains the eminent poet. As a poet, all in all, 39 poems have survived from Bedros Tourian and there is no documentary evidence that he wrote more, and the rest were lost. Of those 39 poems, 26 were written during the last two years of his life. The plays he wrote are all forgotten but Bedros Tourian remains remembered to this day, mostly for the 39 poems he wrote.
Robert Haddejian, the dean of the Armenian journalists and a literary icon in his own right noted that when Levon Der Bedrossian, as the newly nationally elected first president of Armenia, paid a visit to Istanbul, the only request he had for an unscheduled event was visiting Bedros Tourian's tomb and pay homage to the young poet as his homage to all the Armenians buried in the famous Armenian cemetery in Üsküdar, Istanbul. Robert Haddejian claims that Bedros Tourian's tomb remains the most popular visitation site for Armenians visiting Istanbul.
Alice Stone Blackwell (September 14, 1857 – March 15, 1950) translated Bedros Tourian’s poems into English. Her translation of the poem "My Death" is posted below.
MY DEATH
WHEN Death’s pale angel stands before my face?
With smile unfathomable, stern and chill,
And when my sorrows with my soul exhale,
Know yet, my friends, that I am living still.
When at my head a waxen taper slim
With its cold rays the silent room shall fill,
A taper with a face that speaks of death,
Yet know, my friends, that I am living still.
When, with my forehead glittering with tears,
They in a shroud enfold me, cold and chill
As any stone, and lay me on a bier,
Yet know, my friends, that I am living still.
When the sad bell shall toll—that bell, the laugh
Of cruel Death, which wakes an icy thrill—
And when my bier is slowly borne along,
Yet know, my friends, that I am living still.
When the death-chanting priests, dark browed, austere,
With incense and with prayers the air shall fill,
Rising together as they, pass along,
Yet know, my friends, that I am living still.
When they have set my tomb in order fair,
And when, with bitter sobs and wailing shrill,
My dear ones from the grave at length depart,
Yet know, my friends, I shall be living still.
But when my grave forgotten shall remain
In some dim nook, neglected and passed by,
When from the world my memory fades away,
That is the time when I indeed shall die!
