The Rainbow in My Clouds

In 1979 Dr. Maya Angelou became my mother. No, she never suckled me at her breast and no, she never cradled me in her arms, but how did she become my lifeline? A literary umbilical cord formed between she and I, and until her recent death, it has never been severed. To be honest, I’m not even sure if death alone could cut the cord that exists between the two of us. Yes, her earthly body has been abandoned for an ancestral form somewhere in the sky, yet, I still feel her warmth, her gentleness and her mothering spirit.

Don’t get me wrong; I had a mother. Two mothers, to be exact, but for what I experienced the summer of ’79, the mothers I had were not prepared to support me in the way I needed. Their words were empty and their capacity to understand my suffering had not matured to a level that made them capable of feeding my starving soul. So, in stepped Dr. Angelou with her memoir I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings.

When I tell people Dr. Angelou’s book saved my life, I am not exaggerating. That summer, my innocence was stripped away from me, and no one but Dr. Angelou had the words to express all that I was feeling: “Could I tell her now? The terrible pain assured me that I couldn’t. What he did to me, and what I allowed, must have been very bad if already God let me hurt so much” (I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, 1970). ‘How did she know?’ the eleven-year-old me wondered. How did she know that I, too, felt like a caged bird? How did she know that I couldn’t tell anyone either? And how did she know I, too, felt abandoned by the heavenly God that was supposed to protect sweet little innocent girls like her and me?

Along with reading, writing became my savior too. Seeing the beautiful brown image of Dr. Angelou on the back of her book cover was enough to validate the writer who was bubbling up inside of me. Through writing, I could rewrite the past, the present—even the future. I could create giants with Old Testament fury who annihilated those monsters that stalked the earth for helpless young princesses who bore a striking resemblance to me. I could reverse all of the past atrocities done to the meek long before they had the opportunity to inherit the earth.  Reading and absorbing Dr. Angelou’s poetry allowed me to be brave and wise enough to revisit how I viewed myself.  One poem in particular that reorganized my image of the self was “Phenomenal Woman” (1978):

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.

I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size  

But when I start to tell them,

They think I’m telling lies.

I say,

It’s in the reach of my arms,

The span of my hips,  

The stride of my step,  

The curl of my lips.  

I’m a woman

Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,  

That’s me.

There isn’t a woman alive who has ever read those words out loud and didn’t strut around knowing Dr. Angelou wrote those words especially for her. As a result of Dr. Angelou’s bodacity and unapologetic usurping of the mainstream’s idea of what is beautiful, I started writing poetry that showed my appreciation for those parts about me that society deemed unappealing. I wrote poems celebrating my broad nose, my nappy hair and my ample butt. I wrote myself out of bad relationships and unfulfilling jobs. I rewrote society’s reflection of me so that when I looked in the mirror I saw the woman Dr. Angelou wrote about.

Dr. Angelou’s death has left me breathless, but I am finally starting the process of resuscitating myself again through her wonderful and magical words as well as the knowledge that as long as I have a memory of her and her empowering prose and poetry, she will forever remain the rainbow in my clouds.

Angela Jackson-Brown is a writer and poet who teaches Creative Writing and English at Ball State University in Muncie, IN. She is a graduate of Troy State University, Auburn University and Spalding University’s Low Residency MFA in Creative Writing Program. Her work has appeared in literary journals, such as: Pet Milk, Uptown Mosaic Magazine,New Southerner Literary Magazine,The Louisville Review,Muscadine Lines: A Southern Journal,Blue Lake Review,Identify Theory,Toe Good Poetry, and94 Creations. Her short story, “Something in the Wash,” was awarded the 2009 fiction prize by New Southerner Literary Magazine and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in Fiction. Her debut novel, Drinking from a Bitter Cup, was published by WiDo Publishing on January 7, 2014. She is currently working on her second novel.

Of Inherent Value: Viv Albertine

Last summer, I saw three movies in one go by Joanna Hogg, including her latest, Exhibition,which stars Viv Albertine. Albertine’s performance compelled me to pursue her further, and conveniently, her memoir was released last November by MacMillan Publishing. I don’t often read memoirs but when I do, it’s usually by a singer who also happens to be a woman. In the last four years, I only read two memoirs that I really liked: Lady Sings the Blues byBillie HolidayandI Put a Spell On YoubyNina Simone. Both books were ghostwritten by white male writers.

Viv Albertine’s memoir Clothes Clothes Clothes, Music Music Music, Boys Boys Boys is entirely self-penned in what Dwight Garner dubs “an honest, lo-fi grace. If it were better written, it would be worse.” (New York Times). As a matter of fact, Albertine dedicates an entire chapter in the book to why she didn’t go with a ghostwriter and the resulting conflict between her and her former manager based on her decision; the chapter ends up becoming a heroic anecdote for all women who wish to write their own stories everywhere. (Women everywhere: Write your own story! Let it not be mediated through some poorly executed process that’ll water it down to some lame rhetoric that lacks your substance (your touch, your smell, your memory, your voice) and is instead a list of general events and public people that have all been written about again and again for years and years by the same old big ass corporate media channels that tell you that those same events and people are important when in fact they really have nothing to do with your touch, your smell, your memory, and your voice.)

Reading Albertine’s memoir feels like a long chat with an attentive friend—one who is older, wiser, more experienced and infinitely cool—the kind that’ll tell you that some awful things may happen in life but it’s fine because you’re an alright gal. Her voice is precisely the kind that I keep searching for in life. It’s good to have role models, especially one that offers instructions on how to be fearless in a world that is disdainful of women who think and create. There are not too many places women can look to for such instructions. As I read, Albertine’s illustrations of her own struggles, anxieties and triumphs spanning nearly six decades became a kind of soundboard for me to work out my own navigation of this life courageously.  

Albertine’s memoir examines the stifled culture of her time filled with boredom and social atrophy that she and her peers revolted against—a “movement” which was eventually labeled the umbrella term “punk,” although Albertine herself doesn’t recognize any of those incidents under a light of such Romance. She has a frank way of elaborating on her scuffles, battles, tender moments—all the complexities that come with young relationships and collaboration. My favorite story of hers is the one about Sid Vicious asking her if he could wear her jeans but she tells him ‘no’ without mentioning why (a period stain). He later goes into her house with the excuse that he needs to use the toilet and returns wearing her jeans anyway, grinning, as if he then knew why she said he couldn’t wear them. The moment is so telling of each personality and the dynamic of their friendship.

Albertine knows full-well that the pressures around her reader will always disagree with who and what she is, but her memoir implicitly seeks to make the reader feel empowered, understood, and granted permission to trust her own instincts first.

Grace Jung is the author of Deli Ideology and producer of feature documentary A-Town Boyz, directed by Eunice Lau. Her translation of Lee Cheong-jun’s The Abject (벌레 이야기) is forthcoming at MerwinAsia Publishing. She is currently developing her first feature narrative and writing her second novel. She is a former Fulbright scholar and lives in New York. Follow her on Twitter. 

This post is the first in a series curated by Grace Jung, guest editor of Literary Mothers in the coming weeks.

Here’s my big old 2021 book roundup . I think graphic novels and nonfiction (!) really stood out this year (and a handful of picture books, which I didn’t draw each month because I’d be painting for another entire year).

Books read in November 2021

ALONE by Megan E. Freeman

BIRD BY BIRD by Anne Lamott

THE APOTHECARY by Maile Meloy

BIRDS ART LIFE by Kyo Maclear

.

Unintentionally mostly read bird books all month

Thirii Myo Kyaw Myint was born in Myanmar – formerly Burma – and grew up there until her family emigrated when she was eight, moviing to San Jose, Calif., “a place with strip malls, ranch-style houses, and foothills in every direction,” a place she still has “no name for.”

Her new memoir, Names for Light, covers four generations of her family’s history. “Composed in compressed, laser-sharp interrogations of immigration and prejudice, colonialism and inheritance, Names for Light reads like poetry,” says our critic Martha Anne Toll – you can find her full review here.

I am planning a trip to Ireland in May to be with my great uncle on his 100th birthday. While I’m there, I’ll also make time for a yoga retreat with my dad, visiting sites steeped in folklore, and reconnecting with the land of some of my ancestors. A memoir, a novel, and a witchcraft book are each on my to-read list in preparation. (more…)

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Exploring New Genres: Inspirational Memoirs

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ll notice I have a very definitive preferred genre: young adult sci-fi/fantasy. Sometimes I’ll stray into adult sci-fi/fantasy or YA realistic fiction, but rarely do I roam farther than that. This year, I am making an effort to read other genres and have discovered some really inspiring memoirs that appeal to my interests. (more…)

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March Wrap Up

I’ve been letting this blog fall to the wayside and that makes me really sad. I’m going to try to make a bigger effort to get my reviews back on track. Until then, my March Wrap Up!

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“I am indeed over 40, dear lady. Do you prefer your gentlemen younger, same age, or older than you? I will confess, you had me intrigued at “curvy, tall, natural redhead, silvering, and easily stimulated.” I have enjoyed your captions on images and look forward to digging further back to learn more of this sensual creature you are lovely.”

Your flattery is not unwelcome, thank you. (Who doesn’t like a compliment now and then?)
And, you have good taste in Tumblrs to follow if you are one of mine. (Shameless self-love.)

The current gentleman is a couple years older, and He feels quite good. I do not say “my” current gentleman as He technically is not “mine”, and saying “my” or “mine” feels tabu (and possessive). W/we have gently gone back and forth on this point but ever-the-lawyer’s-daughter, I love technicalities, and call them out, tactfully. I also have a superstition similar to having a name tattooed on your skin: it’s bad luck. Labeling Him “mine” when he is not mine, to me, might tempt the Gods to say, “Sorry honey, that’s not gonna happen.” I could not live with myself if that happened. As for age… I have had younger men in this decade, as young as 27. One was like an untrained hunting dog: great potential, enthusiastic abilities but no idea how to use any of them, or in what order or strength. This may sound unladylike and cold: he was fun but clueless when it came to seduction, female sex, and slow-burn pleasuring. I sent him home before breakfast but after coffee, and long before my real-life responsibility arrived from their weekend with the other parent. I do not want to be someone’s leader, though I’ve been complimented on my teaching skills. Current Gentleman is helping me see I need to be lead by an intelligent, confident, strong, masculine male. Not a hard ass but an Alpha Hetero Male. Hunting Dog was male but not a leader at all. Current Gentleman is a natural teacher; He invites me to explore submission; rather, He is unlocking a lot of things I have denied my whole life. It is an unexpected gift, this exploration. And, I am glad it is Him.

A few years ago, I was with an older man. Older by about seven years. He had quite a talent for seduction, big hand/great touch, excellent kisser. Drove an old red Suburban I nicknamed ‘The Shuttle’ because pieces of it would fall off in my driveway. A transplanted mid-westerner whose luck fell somewhere between “none” and “scratch-off”, he was a mediocre cook (though he called himself a chef. He was not a chef) who painted (houses, barns, etc.). When he wasn’t liquid and emotional on cheap red wine, I felt safe.

My favorite date was in the beginning; our sixth or seventh, in the middle of an ocean beach parking lot (which he did not like at all), about this time of year. He picked me up on a Sunday after I’d gone to church. The plan was to have a picnic in his ‘burban, at the beach. But that wasn’t my plan. I wanted to fool around in daylight; up to then, we’d made out a few times, petted, but nothing below the belt. Nothing. I do not make the first move…but that Sunday I was feeling too randy to wait for him to stop being nice. It took gently climbing onto and straddling him, bare bottomed in a skirt and unbuttoned sweater, for him to finally understand exactly what I wanted for lunch and *then* he gave in.

He was stubborn when it came to sex. I always felt pushy — but he never said no. Always stalled taking his pants off. Always wanted to make me cum first. Never understood that I like being made to wait; he had no sense of play in the bedroom at all. The way he sucked in his breath the first time I took him into my mouth that afternoon was such a rush. He was very quiet after I finished, asking if I could do it again, soon, please. Later, he told me he had no idea other women had been doing it ‘wrong.’ (Really? There’s a wrong way? Poor him.)

We were engaged, briefly, for about two months. The wine consumption killed it for me. That, and I wanted more, an equal, a friend, a mutual, playful lover, a partner. We were not “evenly yolked”, as the Bible calls it.

Then, it all hit me and, tired of wrong choices, I took a break. About two years. I was done with men and seeking someone spiritually, mentally, socially, and please, God, sexually compatible because that person was not on the planet. I’d been married a dozen years earlier, a bright, feisty girl in a sexless marriage, long before any of these dalliances transpired. Once every three or four months (or less). Not kidding. I was pretty, smart, present, affectionate, capable and completely miserable. Eight years of that, and I left. Lack of sex was the least reason. But after the older man, I shut down and was done.

Current Man and I somehow stumbled across each other and the rest unfolds as I write.
It is more than a year but not two. It’s interesting, really strange but good, fun, challenging because it is also long distance (same continent, long drive; single parents on single parent budgets). I was not looking nor was I expecting anything. Me and The Universe had a couple teary conversations and after that, I gave my troubles away, like letting go a balloon and didn’t look back. He was looking, His personal ad is probably still on the dating site, but we did not meet that way. Facebook. High School. And that is where I will leave you, this fine Monday morning.

Agent 355

Spoiler Free Review of

Homework by Julie Andrews and Emma Walton Hamilton

I very rarely pick up biographies, memoirs or anything of that sort, I have to be intrigued enough by the person to really put the time in. I generally find them to be dense with information and not something I can sit with for long.

However, I do love Julie Andrews. Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music are two movies that have been with me since childhood, so reading all the behind the scenes stuff was very interesting to me. All the tidbits about Walt Disney, the way they added the animation back then to working with that many kids in The Sound of Music had me very interested.

I also had no idea about the amount of stage work she had done throughout the years, starting at such a young age and being put into the role of supporting her family. I can’t imagine living with that kind of pressure when I was a young child. The things she survived throughout her life could’ve taken her down a far less impressive path, yet she still managed to become the beautiful person she is today. As I was reading this book I feel like I learned 1000 new things about Julie Andrews and maybe 1 or 2 about myself as well.

Memoirs still aren’t my favourite genre of book, but I’m glad I stepped out of my comfort zone for Julie Andrews. I give this book 4 stars ⭐️

I sense the end of my horrid book slump approaching. Thank you to Hachette Canada for the fresh read. Working on Homework by Julie Andrews and Emma Walton Hamilton.

Current Read is The End Of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe! This is a reread for me, and I think I like it even more the second time around!