It Doesn't Ever Occur To You, As

I Always Thought I'd Get Farther. I'd Like To Blame The World For What I've Failed To Do, But The Failure - The Failure That Sometimes Washes Over Me As Anger, Makes Me So Angry I Could Spit - Is All Mine, In The End. What Made My Obstacles Insurmountable, What Consigned Me To Mediocrity, Is Me, Just Me. I Thought For So Long, Forever, That I Was Strong Enough -- Or I Misunderstood What Strength Was.

The Apartment Was Entirely, Was Only, For Her: A Wall Of Books, Both Read And Unread, All Of Them Dear To Her Not Only In Themselves, Their Tender Spines, But In The Moments Or Periods They Evoked… Her Self, Then, Was Represented In Her Books; Her Times In Her Records; And The Rest Of The Room She Thought Of As A Pure, Blank Slate.

There Questions Of Wanting To Be An Artist, And What Does That Mean, What Makes You An Artist? Are You An Artist If You're In A Gallery In New York And Not An Artist If You're Doing It At Home? Do You Need Legitimation To Count? If You've Been Acculturated To Believe That You Have Certain Obligations - Familial, Social, Human - If Multitasking Has Been Your Forte And That's What's Been Praised And Rewarded, Where Do You Find The Single-mindedness, The Selfishness To Do Something Like Art? I Think Those Are Questions That Arise Differently For Women And For Men.

Anyway, These Books I Love, They’re All Books By Men—every Last One Of Them. Because If It’s Unseemly And Possibly Dangerous For A Man To Be Angry, It’s Totally Unacceptable For A Woman To Be Angry. I Wanted To Write A Voice That For Me, As A Reader, Had Been Missing From The Chorus: The Voice Of An Angry Woman.

I Always Say To My Students, If You Can Do Anything Other Than Writing And Be Happy, Then You Should.