some more notes for Leslie on her piece last week with some links that might interest y'all

Hi, Leslie. This is really beautiful and working quite well. I actually love the form (with the lines the long line dividing) and I think you should keep it (if you can add some white space like I have done.). To me it doesn’t seem finished (a short braid) I want to hear more…more about your mother and her death and the loss of the house. I don’t think it needs to be too much longer maybe just a few more sections. Right now the piece seems to be so much about femininity, mothers/daughters and clothing/ representation – what is expected of women. I’d perhaps like to see something about being 52 and having long hair (people say women of a certain age shouldn’t have long hair) or a scene of you now braiding your hair. Another possibility: introducing something about braids not personal…ie historical, a fact, famous women with braids, etc. Not sure you want to go in this direction. This piece also seems to be about economics/poverty of a certain kind. I would love that to come out a little bit more as well. You have such a beautiful light touch here. The details are really stunning. I love the stool with the found hairs. It reminds me of that Jack Gilbert poem “Married” Do you know it?  Here it is:

Married, Jack Gilbert

I came back from the funeral and crawled

around the apartment, crying hard,

searching for my wife’s hair.

For two months got them from the drain,

from the vacuum cleaner, under the refrigerator,

and off the clothes in the closet.

But after other Japanese women came,

there was no way to be sure which were

hers, and I stopped. A year later,

repotting Michiko’s avocado, I find

a long black hair tangled in the dirt.

*

(Essay 2)

Dear Leslie,

It is difficult to write about illness. I think you are off to a good start however. My main comment is: keep going, get a draft out. Not sure if you want this to be a lyric essay or just a personal essay – doesn’t really matter. I do think you should pick one pov and stick with it. For some reason the second person is working better for me/your language it seems. I love the last paragraph and would love it to come a bit sooner in the piece. You are really on the right track with that. I am wondering if you’ve read Megan ORourk’s piece in the New Yorker about her immune-deficiency disease? It’s a great piece because it’s kind of what you are writing about – a complicated illness that is difficult to explain or understand. Check it out if you have time: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/08/26/130826fa_fact_orourke

As with your other piece, please keep going. best, Sarah