Oh, Suzannah

thank you

I was lying on a bed
in a hotel room
in Isle of Palms, South Carolina
last week waiting
for my daughter to get ready
to go into Charleston
when I thought to search
Suzannah Lessard

It had been a while
since I’d thought of her
much longer since I’d seen her
I wondered what she was up to

Last I knew
she was working on something
with another mentor of mine
from Goucher
I hoped to find an update
on their collaboration

My search ended
at a New York Times
obituary

No!

And not even two months ago

She was 81
she died of complications
from endometrial cancer

We weren’t close

I guess that goes without saying

Not that I didn’t want to be
but my efforts to keep up
after I finished the program
weren’t met with much more
than a quick response

When I’d see her we’d chat
but not the way she’d chat
with certain other alums

It hurt

I wanted to be part of her circle
I wasn’t part of her circle

Why that stung
was that she was my first
—and a fabulous—
mentor in Goucher’s MFA
in Creative Nonfiction

and she saw me

When it was my turn
to be workshopped
during my first residency
she introduced my piece thusly:

“This
is the story
of a soul”

I’m tearing up
even as I remember it

Because what I shared was raw
vulnerable and naked

And she made sure
my words and my soul
were treated with great care

She didn’t coddle me
she gave excellent critiques
but she saw my story for what it was
and went Mama Bear on my behalf

Nobody in that group
was going to fuck with me or my words
if she had anything to say about it

I cried to my therapist
that I couldn’t stay connected
after our program
the way I wanted to

“You let her into your bedroom
while she only let you into her kitchen”
she reflected

Exactly

Of course this is metaphorical
and what she meant was
our relationship wasn’t equal

First by design
then by choice
her choice

I had to come to terms
with this loss
with wanting more
with not being able to get it

Ten years of hard-won wisdom
has given me the distance to see
I wanted more from her
than she could possibly give

That my wish
my aching need
for a Mama Bear protector
oozed out
overwhelmed

maybe she had to distance herself
because I couldn’t contain
my aching need

I forgive myself
for the ooze
and the overwhelm

It makes so much sense
I would have tried to get more
where that came from

but it also stung
because we are both survivors
of a kind of abuse
that is singular
and devastating

Both of us
were molested
by our fathers

I assumed a kinship in that
I felt a kinship in that
not that it wasn’t real
but it wasn’t equal either

I grieve her death though
not just because
she tended to me
like one would a baby bird
but because she was
an exceptional human

Her mind was like few others
I know it’s not fair to say that
without giving examples
but I can’t adequately capture it

Mainly because I do not have
her kind of intellect
it was both academic and artsy
its depth and breadth beyond
what I’m used to
what most are of capable of

Okay, I’ll try
In my first semester
she had us do these group emails
where each of us led
a discussion about whichever book
she had selected for us
she chose our books
based on the nature and content
of our prospective projects

From her replies in these emails
you could tell she hadn’t spent a second
editing her responses—so many typos

They meandered like her mind
then would came magically
to her brilliant point
They were a total delight to read

Actually here’s an example
because I just realized
I still have these emails
I didn’t delete her emails
of course I didn’t delete her emails
(I may not be
her caliber of intellect
but I ain’t stupid)

In one she wrote:
“When you have material
that has various big narratives in it
like [American Requiem],
a big danger is that you get tangled up
in the what I call the big oceanic kelp
of long majorstories that seem
like they have to be told
yet in the telling overwhelm
the main story. That kelp
can just wrap around your legs
and bring you down in the surf
and you drown.”
[sic]

See what I mean?

So much of what she wrote
was thoughtful and nuanced
and pure pleasure to read

One story I remember her telling
during one of her readings/lectures
was how she gave herself
a weekly assignment to do things
in New York City, where she lived,
that she had never done before

One such excursion had her pop into
a Pentecostal church during a service
where everyone was raising their arms
singing while swaying back and forth
their eyes closed

so she joined in
raised her arms
closed her eyes
swayed back and forth

I so loved the image
of this curly-white-haired
70-something-year-old white woman
letting herself be moved
by the spirit
of curiosity and play

I imagined her not being
at all self-conscious
because that was who she was
or at least who she seemed to be—
present, free, open, alive

She and I played tennis at Goucher
I taught her yoga at Goucher
When she heard me say something
about Twitter
she asked me to be her mentor
then sent me her first tweet

She used words like “vitiate”
as if it were everyday language
Need I say more?

I have read some but hardly all
of her many writings

I should add that she wrote
for The New Yorker
for 20 years
(If I’d said that above
it could have cut through
any question in your mind
that she was anything but superior)

I wish our circles overlapped
after Goucher
I wish I’d known she’d been diagnosed
with cancer
I would have made sure to let her know
again
how significant she was to me
and thank her
again
for her tenderness
toward me and my story

Instead, I will remember her as a pioneer
in memoir writing
in telling an ugly
controversial family story
with grace
while holding tightly to her right
to tell her truth—
to not write it, she said,
would have been “creative death”

What a powerful model
What a formidable woman

Brava, Suzannah!

Thank you, forever,
for being a midwife
to the story of my soul

Suzannah, during my Commencement Reading. Captured by my son.
2016