Revealing A Secret
Perl brilliantly uses her poems as a way to structure and divide the essay, and I really did appreciate the genre bending way that the author could incorporate those two, often times separated, forms together. Not only are the poems themselves a physical sign of the division in the essay, they also point to the different stages and states of the author’s life and writing—a wonderful touch. We had the opportunity to enter the innermost sanctums of the poet/essayists emotive space while watching her womanhood change. This technique helped the author’s voice shine. She pulls us in with her intimate and perfectly paced revelations.
Revealing the secret of the mother-in-law’s gun was also a very complicated way to reveal how secrets can be inherited through a myriad of ways and from the most unexpected places. Most importantly the reveal explains how relationships are cultivated, even after death, in uncanny places as objects take meanings of their own. Meanings often outlast a life. Similar to what writing can do.
My favorite reveal in this essay is in the last paragraph. Just when we think that as writers, and her students, we have a complete picture of Perl, she reveals that there are even more intimate parts of herself, and her writing, that she has kept just for the self. More often than not, I come across the idea that writing should be for consumption by an audience, and those audiences give it its value. It was nice to be reminded that writing is a form of self-care and reflection.
