‘river of names,’ by dorothy allison. just fucking amazing. i literally did not know how to respond after reading it because it struck me so hard. maybe it’s because it’s just a relentless story. or maybe it’s because it reminds me of my own family. my great-grandfather. my grandmother being starved by her mother-in-law when she was pregnant. the abuse. just so much abuse. ‘river of names’ was far worst but it reminded me of my family and i just knew why the narrator didn’t want to tell her lover about the past. i don’t talk about my family with people i know. i might have in high school. not anymore. when i do talk about it in real life i’m very glib. i smile and people don’t know how to respond to a person smiling when they talk about how their grandmother beat their father or how their father tried to blow up the house. i don’t know. some people in class didn’t get that. i guess it’s hard to understand. i’m glad the speaker didn’t tell. more realistic. less movie-of-the-week its all better now ending.
we turned in two poems for my poetry workshop. we’ll probably workshop mine next week. i hope.
i sent a poem to this online magazine. they said they liked it but it wasn’t what they were looking for. oh, well. first time i’ve ever tried. i am getting a couple of older poems published in a book.
my father and i got into a major fight. i drove up to the window at the drive thru and i was crying. it was so embarassing. we talked afterwards and it wasn’t quite so bad. my mom doesn’t know.
Hey. I can understand how you felt about “River of Names” – I felt the same. Struck me like a lightning. Word for the things one cannot tell.
Yes, it was a strangely beautiful and striking story. I still remember it from much earlier in the year.