Wednesday, May 2, 2012

On Stacy Doris

http://www.eveningwillcome.com/mainpage.html

Laynie Brown, a poet I admire, compiled this homage to Stacy Doris.

I never had the opportunity to meet Stacy Doris in person. I fell in love with her through her book Paramour, and then with every successive book I read by her, all the more in love. Conference was life changing. Stacy Doris was the kind of writer I wanted to be.

When, years after my first exposure, I had my first chapbook accepted for publication and needed to find a blurbist, I reached out to Stacy Doris. Though we had never met, she was generous in her response both to me as a person and to my writing. I was astounded by her kindness, which translated through email even. And she was even kind enough to maintain a brief correspondence with me, this stranger. I made a video for A Cake Part when she requested it.

And then she passed and I was sad. And because I had never met her in person, I didn't feel entitled to grieve. I didn't feel entitled to write anything for this homage when I saw the call came out. But when I read what Maxine Chernoff had to say, I cried.