#356 Backstory of the Poem “Gray” by Jude Pastor

Can you go through the step-by-step process of writing this poem from the moment the idea was first conceived in your brain until final form? Since this is a very old poem of mine, I cannot remember the step-by-step process of creating it. However, I remember a few things. I remember a book (The Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys ) that reminded me of how I was feeling at the conception of the poem. I remember feeling alienated from the world. I remember that the poem came quite quickly, with few revisions and that I had been writing it in my head for a while.

Click on the below link to order THE WIDE SARGASSO SEA by Jean Rhys on Amazon.

There were particular phrases and words that resonated with me for years from other works. One element was from Charlotte Bronte’s, “Jane Eyre,” (obviously, “the madwoman in the attic.”) There was a deeply felt identification with that unseen character, although she is barely discovered in Bronte’s novel.

Click on below link to order JANE EYRE by Charlotte Bronte from Amazon

She is a mystery to the reader, but we feel that she is mistreated, not actually mad, but controlled by a force over which she has no control. We feel her desperation and resistance, her will to survive and to escape; her victimization is real.

What month and year did you start writing this poem? It was 2001, after the 9/11 attack in the United States. I started writing the poem during my divorce from my children’s father, while still living in England.

Which part of the poem was the most emotional of you to write and why? “Gray” is a poem, which I wrote well over two decades ago, which makes it challenging for me to recall the exact process, although there is always a process.

However, I do remember that I had just returned to South Carolina from the U.K. where I had been living for around eleven years.

Charleston is a historic American city, which I had always found interesting and beautiful as a child. I grew up in S.C. although my mother is a Detroit native & my father is Honduran.

Since I had been away for so very long, I wanted to visit Charleston and show my own children the city. However, with adult eyes, I did not experience it in the same way that I had.

The racism seemed more pronounced to me than it ever had, although it was nothing new. I was struck by my perception that it had not changed, and actually seemed to have worsened since the 80s.

Although I did grow up in the State, my family is multicultural. I am multiracial and had never felt at home here, nor had I felt welcome. Seeing this place, which does possess great natural beauty and other charms, from the perspective of not having lived here for a long period, it was disheartening.

I had idealistically hoped to see progress, but instead, I felt more alienated than ever and questioned my decision to return. Having also felt alienated living as an expat in England, I wondered if there was any place that would ever feel like “home.”

I was reminded of a book that I love, which was written in 1966 and stands on its own but is meant to be a prequel to Charlotte Bronte’s, “Jane Eyre.” It is, “The Wide Sargasso Sea,” by Dominican-British author Jean Rhys. Rhys’s book is often seen from a feminist perspective, although I see it more strongly as a perspective on colonialism. To be sure, it is both. I suppose our perspective depends on where we are currently viewing it from and what we are able to see from that vantage point.

LEFT: First edition of WILD SARGASSO SEA. RIGHT: Jean Rhys in the 1970s.

From my new point of view, Charleston (as a symbol of the State of South Carolina itself) was the madwoman in the attic, as was I.

I was saddened and dismayed, but also sympathetic to her plight.

Has this poem been published? And if so where? After my divorce and return to the States, I published this poem as a part of my MFA at the University of South Carolina under the direction of Kwame Dawes in a book called, “Anything Can Happen.”

Click on the link below to visit the website of Kwame Dawes

http://kwamedawes.com/

It was a part of my thesis book, published under my married name, which I had not yet changed back in 2007. Jennifer P. Marchand was my name.

“She” still lives inside of me, although I do not carry this name any longer.

The madwoman in the attic has freed herself, although she had to cut off bits and pieces of herself to get out of the trap. Although I currently remain a resident of this territory, I am free & I am grateful for everything that she has taught me about my own identity and survival.