Flannery's Misfit
Stack Takeover | Angela Alaimo O'Donnell
August 3, 2024, marked the 60th anniversary of the death of Flannery O’Connor. In honor of O’Connor’s work and memory, we have invited Angela Alaimo O’Donnell to take over this Substack for two weeks. In this time, you’ll see a selection of poems from O’Donnell’s book Andalusian Hours: Poems from the Porch of Flannery.
“She would have been a good woman . . . if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life.”
–Flannery O’Connor, “A Good Man is Hard to Find”
A truth that could be said about us all. I’ve yet to meet any living soul whose disposition wouldn’t be improved by a sit-down with brother death. A brand new perspective to let him know how short the time, how quick the breath exits your body and leaves you stone cold and mute after so much talk. Same goes for me. I’m dyin’ every day. Sickness my Misfit. I won’t grow old so I need to get wise the fast way. I guess you might say I’m in luck. I stare down the barrel, write what I see, pray it might make a good woman of me.
Angela Alaimo O’Donnell, PhD is a professor, poet, scholar, and writer at Fordham University in New York City, and serves as Associate Director of Fordham’s Curran Center for American Catholic Studies. Her publications include two chapbooks and nine full-length collections of poems. Her book Holy Land (2022) won the Paraclete Press Poetry Prize. In addition, O’Donnell has published a memoir about caring for her dying mother, Mortal Blessings: A Sacramental Farewell; a book of hours based on the practical theology of Flannery O’Connor, The Province of Joy; and a biography Flannery O’Connor: Fiction Fired by Faith. Her ground-breaking critical book on Flannery O’Connor Radical Ambivalence: Race in Flannery O’Connor was published by Fordham University Press in 2020. Her poems have appeared in many journals and anthologies, including Able Muse, Alabama Literary Review, America, The Bedford Introduction to Literature (anthology), Christian Century, Christian Poetry in America Since 1940 (anthology), Christianity & Literature, Contemporary Catholic Poetry (anthology), Flannery O’Connor Review, Italian Americana, Italian Poetry Review, Literary Matters, Mezzo Cammin, Peacock Journal, Presence, Reformed Journal, and Taking Root in the Heart (anthology), among others. O’Donnell’s eleventh book of poems, Dear Dante, was published in Spring 2024.
Chills! I hear her voice in this. So good.
This poem has a thoughtful and urgent cadence to match the force of Flannery's words. My favorite fiction quote of hers. Good poem to match.