Date of Award
5-2025
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.F.A.
Degree Program
Creative Writing
Department
English
Major Professor
James, Juyanne
Second Advisor
Hembree, Carolyn
Third Advisor
Gisleson, Anne
Abstract
What Love Left: A Memoir is a collection of creative nonfiction essays and poems that explore the lifelong impact of grief following the death of my older brother when I was just two years old. The collection is divided into four sections—The Child, The Family, The Self, and The World, which shows how such an early loss can form identity, memory, relationships, and views on the world. Through lyrical language, raw character development, and intimate reflections, this memoir shows what grief leaves behind, how it lives inside me, and how storytelling has become a form of survival and preservation.
This memoir was formed, not from the need to resolve grief, but to survive within it. The essays reflect what was lost while continuing to discover what can be found through writing. Ultimately, What Love Left: A Memoir is a personal exploration of how destabilizing pain can ultimately become something that helps carry us forward.
Recommended Citation
Perkins, Abbigale N., "What Love Left: A Memoir" (2025). University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations. 3258.
https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/3258
Rights
The University of New Orleans and its agents retain the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible this dissertation or thesis in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. The author retains all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis or dissertation.