Unveiling Hidden Worlds: How Rachel Eliza Griffiths’ The Flower Bearers Transforms Grief Into Art
Throughout The Flower Bearers, Griffiths pulls back the covers on the ups and downs of a writer’s life, sharing her experiences in writing workshops and at writing retreats and what it takes to make a living as a writer. Cave Canem, an intentional space for Black poets, is a safe place for Griffith. However, she often encounters hostility in her workshops at Sarah Lawerence College. She also describes herself feeling like “a fly in the buttermilk” at a Saratoga Springs writing retreat. To make matters worse, a Black elder poet she hoped would mentor her instead admonishes her, leading to Griffiths having a dissociative episode, and quitting poetry for four years.
