Sitting in a Stranger’s Bathtub

Sitting in a Stranger's Bathtub is a collection of poetry interested in the relationship between grief and time. It seems the more grief "happens" or rather, reiterates or transforms itself (a birth provoked by something unknown and can only be attributed to time and its maturing), the more grief splinters and splits off creating alternate dimensions in which things went a little bit differently, where something grand can be imagined like being present for a mother's death. These poems consider these worlds half by choice, in order to let those lives continue in their mundane yet miraculous ways, and half by possession. These poems seek to represent the horrible pang of deja vu that proves the existence of alternate happenings, and also justify deja vu as a sensation intended to fill the fragments of memory. In keeping with the tradition of the Confessional movement, these poems aim toward honesty, toward revealing the truth, only possible by showing the failures of memory, particularly in the presence of grief.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Fine Arts

Level thesis:degree_level

masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Creative Writing

Department dc:contributor.department

English

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

2023

Author dc:creator

• Sullivan, Shannon Kerri

Chair dc:contributor.committeechair

• Smith, Carmen Gimenez

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Vollmer, James M.
• Queen, Khadijah

• Mother
• waiting
• grief
• reach
• addiction
• withdrawals
• dying
• forgiveness
• God
• suspended
• crepuscular
• living
• listen
• exist
• fear
• therapy
• memory.

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en

Dc Identifier Other

vt_gsexam:36088

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/114999