Interlude | Westward, a Woman Walks
Reflections on Joy Sullivan’s Instructions for Traveling West that are different from Oprah’s
I miss social media, and I miss out by choosing to remain off the grid and feral. I miss friends’ life milestone announcements. I miss trends and pop culture moments (here’s my second Hawk Tuah girl reference in a single week). And I miss the opportunity to engage with creators whose work I value: authors, poets, musicians releasing new material, embarking on tours, or offering updates. Anne Lamott spoke at the BARDAVON of all places when I happened to be visiting the East Coast and the opportunity to see her came and went without my knowing about it until weeks after.
My decision to deactivate Instagram and Facebook remains firm and clear: especially in a season where I am so vulnerable, I’m thankful I decided on a whim in a Los Angeles hotel room in April 2023 to pull back from the pressure to post and scroll and consume for what was supposed to be just a few weeks. Leaving my life open — even in the most innocuous of ways — to serve as fodder for the hen-pecking of gossip and voyeurism I was subject to in 2022 and 2023 would reduce the significance of these last two years to mere sound bytes that could never capture of the complexity of all these months have meant. It was also shit for my nervous system.
My presence here might simply serve as another platform for exactly all of this, but I’ll wrestle that demon another day.
It’s quite likely that had I not deleted my accounts and fled screen-society, I’d have encountered Joy Sullivan sooner. The back cover of her debut collection of poetry, Instructions for Traveling West, features reviews from voices I turn to for nourishment, wisdom, and light: Kate Baer! Maggie Smith! Lyndsay Rush! For the past several years, I’ve been drawn to the stories of women who’ve eschewed the standard fare of degree-spouse-suburbia-baby-”buy a bunch of shit, retire to Florida, and die” and Sullivan’s station within this ambit suits my interests perfectly. She released IfTW in April, but I learned of it in June, and treated myself to a copy for my birthday. As I made my way from LA to Boston at the start of summer to prepare for baby and settle in to this new rhythm, I carried Sullivan with me. The following poems of hers were among my favorites. I realize Oprah offered such a review herself already, but my selections are different!
I’ll admit much of her writing echoes styles and themes I’ve encountered and loved elsewhere: emotions revealed in Google searches, the eviscerating and nonsensical critique of comment sections, reclaiming embodiment, naming desire, “woman loses man and finds herself.” The familiarity was fresh to return to as I feel myself changing: the irony of so much of this book having to do with fleeing West, when I did exactly that one year ago this week, is not lost on me. I’m also taking the invitation to explore Eve-motifs more deeply in my own spiritual reflection: uniquely maligned even though Adam also ate the apple, I’ve found another complicated companion who might reflect some light back on the shadow-corners of myself.
What happens when we heed the call of furious reinvention, she asks. I’m learning that for myself. I’m making that road by walking one step at a time.
Joy Sullivan’s Instructions for Traveling West can be found here on her website, and her regular rhythm of writing can be found on her Substack,
Instructions for Traveling West
First, you must realize you’re homesick for all the lives you’re not living. Then, you must commit to the road and the rising loneliness. To the sincere thrill of coming apart. Divorce yourself from routine and control. Instead, find a desert and fall in. Take the trail that promises a view. Get lost. Break your toes. Bruise your knees. Keep going. Watch a purple meadow quiver. Get still. Pet trail dogs. Buy the hat. Run out of gas. Befriend strangers. Knight yourself every morning for your newborn courage. Give grief her own lullaby. Drink whiskey beside a hundred-year-old cactus. Honor everything. Pray to something unnameable. Fall for someone impractical. Reacquaint yourself with desire and all her slender hands. Bear beauty for as long as you are able, and if you spot a sunning warbler glowing like a prism, remind yourself –
joy is not a trick.
Peaches
The nursing home stank of ammonia and loneliness.
Thirteen years with Parkinson’s and still
my grandpa used to smile when I spooned peaches,
sticky with syrup, into his mouth. I was little
and my hand would tremble, the spoon would wobble,
my grandpa would shake, and my father wept
outside in the hallway. I never knew my grandfather
in the good years. Before the shaking
started and his memory faded but even now, I remember
climbing beside his pillow with peaches. He’s smile
when I appeared, and I think he almost knew
me then. This is Joy! They’d say and he’d stare at me until
he cried, swallowing slice after slice. It was good to see him
eat so I’d feed him them all and even after they were gone,
he’d still open his mouth. Recently, someone said my
grandfather never really cared for peaches, but he must’ve
loved the little hand that lifted the spoon. These days,
it’s the world that’s topsy-turves. We all shake. Somewhere
in the fog, we beg holiness from one another
with an open mouth. We gulp, saying yes, I love you.
Again. Again.
These Days People are Really Selling Me on California
where no one yet has broken my heart. When I left Ohio,
I left backroads and the endless chop of green
meadow, the cicadas roaring in the splintered heat.
At a party, someone says: Oh, Ohio, I spent a summer
there and now we have this in common: a corn moon
hovering over a harvest. Mulberries sinning read against
the inside of the mouth. I would like to touch the world
and not harm it. I would like to be touched and not
harmed. A friend of mine growing up on a farm
found her hair in the nests of robins. Dark strands
in the structure of the cradle. This is a compliment
I would like to receive. A synonym for purpose.
This must be how a fledgling defines holiness. How
the air gives back grief. Make me something made of flight.
Eve’s Apology
Lamentably, my apology is serving a life sentence and
cannot receive visitors. To be honest, my apology just
bloomed into a field of scarlet peonies. I plucked them
into a bouquet that bled all over your breakfast table. My
apology is stuck in traffic. The weatherman predicted a
storm of apologies next week. However, until then, it will
be sunny. My apology is on its period and the cramps are
really bad. Sadly, I’ve recently gone apology free. Don’t
put any on my sandwich. Unfortunately, I’ve shaved my
apology and we’ll have to wait for it to grow back.
My apology has a dentist appointment. Excuse me,
I misspoke — my apology actually just burst into flames.
Truth be told, you just missed my apology. It left through
the back door. Check the bar. Thank you for your inquiry,
but my apology is currently out of the office until forever.
I regret to inform you I have killed my apology
by wringing its neck with both my hands. Don’t worry,
it didn’t suffer.