Eye level

Find here: past, language, future, present, lessons.
Find here: history, yearning and movement.
Find here a vulnerability to tell truth about leaning all the ways to disguise truth- study here, time; & acknowledge the honesty of it passing.

Jenny Xie’s Eye Level reminded me of the immediate credibility I lend to a writer when I personally witness and relate to their honesty and vulnerability on the page. Throughout the work I found myself meditating on the pieces where Jenny exposed her relationship to writing. Beginning at an early age   (even when I was young, I loved peering at faces in films. The pleasure of watching and of not being watched) , Jenny highlights the beginning of her relationship with writing did  not come with the introduction of a pen or pencil,but rather with the weight of old memories resting upon her; memory sticks like cartliage to the meat of those with the most words. She allows us to see how memory and  experience of the outside world sit with in her body a misfortune can swell for a long long time in the mind and as she is introduced to writing how she uses the process,  like a river, to have such heaviness flow outside of her. However, Jenny does not romanticize this process or the reality of being a poet; Throughout the text there are a few pieces where we are invited to the other side, to see a bit of the tournament with in oneself when holding all these memories, these writings, this desire to write, and the blurred lines between all of those; let there be no braiding of words. I want a spare mouth. I am protective of what eyes cannot pet open. The unannounced. The infinite places within language to hide.
Throughout the text we go everywhere with Jenny, we experience all of the things around her she immediately puts us in scene by creating landscapes of sounds, people, fragrances and visual tapestries she sews before our very eyes on the page. This made me think about the places we all go as individuals, how we all carry collections of the places we have been with us. Xie's perspective brought to light the difference between writers and everyone else for me, and how we decide to make space our lives for these truths and landscapes- funny, the way we come to understand a place by wanting to escape it.


Also- EXIT, EVE  is absolutely incredible, great way to close the middle section and begin the final pages. My favorite poem of the collection!!!!

Thank you Jenny Xie