Word: poeme
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...inspired by the destruction of her home in St. Croix, Virgin Islands by Hurricane Hugo in 1989. In her introduction, she writes that in revising she kept two questions before her: "first, What did I want my readers to feel? and second, What was the work of this poem (its task in the world)?" The varying answers to these questions are apparent in every poem; a passion and sense of history shine through like "a molten hot light...
...Lorde's poems on Blackness and womanhood as well as the specific references to historical events places Undersong not only within the context of Lorde's full life but within the greater context of America over the last thirty years. The book's final poem, entitled "Need: A Chorale for Black Woman Voices" takes the form of a dialogue between the poet and two Black women beaten to death in two American cities in the late seventies. The poet's closing words are "How much of this truth can I bear/ to see/ and still live/ unblinded?/ How much...
...word "blood" appears in many poems in all four of the sections into which Undersong is divided and creates a link between the violence she depicts and her emphasis on birth and children. Children continually appear, especially in the later poems, as pupils whom the poet-teacher Lorde instructs. They reinforce the image of the woman-mother as a central and strong figure. In one poem "Dear Toni Instead of a Letter of Congratulation Upon Your Book and Your Daughter Whom You Say You Are Raising to be a Correct Little Sister," Lorde, as mother-teacher-writer, addresses another mother...
...feminist role model she isn't. Pinning any feminist hopes on a First Lady is a mistake. The Quarterly's poem may declare Hillary a statue of liberty ("she lifts her torch/to all women: "Don't just sit on the porch--"), but she is hardly a NOW poster child...
...final poem, the lengthy "Requiem" touched on the title of the evening's performance. Bloom told the audience that this moving poem was preserved in the memory of women for 25 years before being written down. "Requiem" spoke of the silence of the hundreds of women waiting in line behind closed gates to see their sons. That it was read last Wednesday was clear evidence that the voices of silenced women were finally ringing...