Poetry Anthology - Black Feminist Poetry
Poems by: I am a Black Woman - Mari Evans Coal - Audre Lorde Still I rise - Maya Angelou Homage to my hips - Lucille Clifton Primer For Blacks - Gwendolyn Brooks
Within the feminist agenda, women of colour seemed to hold no place in the predominantly
white fight for freedom and equality. The struggles of Black women were simplified to ‘ the
boundaries of sex and racial discrimination doctrine [that] are defined by white women and
black men’s experiences (Crenshaw, 1989)’. Ultimately, this meant that black women's
experiences were formulated through the extent to which white women and black men’s
struggles ended. For Black women writers, the apparent exclusion and division between the
intersection of their race and gender is something that many have strived to portray through
their writing. As Patricia Collins (2000) says, ‘...reclaiming black women’s ideas also
involves discovering, reinterpreting, and analysing the ideas of subgroups within the larger
collectivity of U.S Black women who have been silenced’. The poems I have selected for my
anthology not only showcases black female poets reclaiming the discourse through their
experiences but also acts as an expression of their black autonomy.
I begin this anthology with a poem by Mari Evans, who actively took part in the Black
Arts Movement along with many twentieth-century Black poets. The movement was
devoted to ‘define the identity of Black people in America and to re-surge the Black aesthetic’
(Lee,2016). Evans poetry discusses matters of the Black experience, deaths of infamous
black figures and the beauty of being black. In her most recognised book, ‘I am a Black
Woman’, her poem ‘I am a Black Woman’ (1970) exhibits the agonising tragedies that are,
unfortunately, the realities of many black women. The bittersweet symphony that is
portrayed at the beginning of the poem ‘the music of my song some sweet arpeggio of tears’
bears resemblance to the slave songs that were used to bolster the spirits of the slaves.
Although it may be comprised of broken cords, ‘arpeggio’, the beauty of the song lies in the
notion that the black community stood as a collective through hardships. Throughout the
poem readers are encouraged to visualise a black woman who has watched her husband
commit suicide to escape the excruciating labour of slavery, Nat Turner’s lynching and the
cries of her son in battle. Black women’s experience isn’t limited to their own life but also to
the lives of others, they are burden with the struggles of black men yet remain ‘strong’ and
‘indestructible’. In choosing this poem, I wished to portray the duality in being black and a
woman, having not only to withstand your own oppression but also the male figures in your
life's oppression with little to no appreciation.
My next selection was also an influential member of the Black Arts Movement during the
’60s and 70’s, her poetry and theory on feminism rendered entirely new debates during her
time. ‘Lorde’s work represents a path beyond national struggle whereby she locates
liberation in the erotic, the body and the act of “working through a discourse of differences to
build coalitions and communities with others” (Higashida, 2011). In her poem ‘Coal’, readers
can see her liberation through the description of the sublime power of being black, it’s a
journey of her perfecting her blackness through her own lense. Her metaphor of her
blackness as ‘how a diamond comes into a knot of flame’ implies her black identity is
being moulded into her true self but it also suggests the cruciality of becoming accustomed
as well as accepting your racial identity just as it is imperative for flames in the creation of
diamonds. Lorde acknowledges the repressive nature society has on the discovery of ones
racial identity as she writes ‘some words live in my throat breeding like adders’ suggesting
her expression of her identity has been dangerously silenced. As Davies points out,
‘For Lorde, cultural identification has to be addressed along with an overtly anti-hegemonic
discourse’. This is why I choose this poem, as it rejects the dominant labels in which
society forces on people of colour and places a need in being empowered by one’s own
race.
‘For a long time, Black women were mute spectators of discrimination. But in the twentieth
century, they began to break their silence and attempt to speak to the readers in a genuine
voice’ (Raman, 2011). Maya Angelou is arguably one of the said black women who created
a new and positive discourse around the experiences of black women. Her poem ‘Still I
Rise’, advocates persistence and perseverance regardless of the difficulties faced by black
woman. Angelou begins the poem with the invitation for society to ‘write [her] down in history
with [their] bitter, twisted lies’, the notion that she is allowing society to conjure what they like
of her showcases her faith in herself as she is determined, regardless of society’s
fabrications, that she will ‘rise’. It is almost as though she is patiently spectating society’s
lies crumb before her. Furthermore, the inclusion of ‘history’ links to the ideological
domination white history has on education and the lack of representation of black women in
said history. As Patricia Collins (2000), states ‘Black women's exclusion from positions of
power within mainstream institutions has led to the elevation of the elite white male’s ideas
and interests and corresponding suppression of black women's ideas and interests’. We as
readers are told, black women are ‘mute spectators’ through the words of men who have
actively tried to erase the work of black women, including Angelou’s poem to my anthology I
attempt to subvert said actions.
Discussions about black women and femininity has previously focussed on how ‘living
under unsanitary and inhumane conditions marked black women as non-women, preventing
them from ever attaining “lady” status’ (Jackson, 1994). Lucy Clifton’s poem ‘Homage To My
Hips’ places emphasis on the feminine features of the speaker with the entire poem solely
composed of celebrating her womanness. The poem pushes the narrative of not confining to
the traditional beauty standard of ‘frail’ and thin hips that society praises (Jackson, 1994),
the notion that the speaker’s hips ‘don’t fit into little petty places’ showcases her confidence
not only in her body but also her femininity as she unapologetically embraces all of herself.
This line in the poem could arguably be commenting on how white middle-class women’s
dominance in the feminist movement often left little to no room for black women, in saying
that her hips ‘don't fit into little petty places’ suggests that her female body does not fit their
description to gain the right to equality. Clifton reclaimed the African-American woman’s body
through reshaping the view of their body being more than just a tool for sexual exploitation,
as during the nineteenth - century ‘rape was a form of institutionalised terrorism that was
used to perpetuate fear and power over defenceless “property”’ (Jackson, 1994). In referring
to her hips as ‘mighty’ and ‘magic’, Clifton re-examines the detrimental history of the body
image of black women and creates a safe place for readers, especially black readers to look
beyond the stereotype and to accept themselves nonetheless.
For the last poem in my anthology, I choose to you the work by the poet Gwendolyn Brooks.
her dedication to promoting black unity and celebrating a collective black culture made her
work highly influential. Brook’s poem ‘Primer For Blacks’, places blackness at the
forefront of black people's lives, it is a ‘preoccupation’ and ‘commitment’. To Brooks, it is
imperative for Black people to bask in the ‘glory’ of blackness - her poem promotes a
fundamental love for oneself. Gwendolyn Brooks attacks the dominant ideology that white
culture dominates the mainstream culture when she writes ‘the conscious shout of all that is
white is “It’s Great to be white”’, the notion that Black people are made to believe that their
culture and heritage is of little to no importance compared to White America is an ideology
that Brooks strives to eradicate in this ‘Primer For Blacks’. Brooks locates her readers to be
black especially at the end of the poem, whereby she directly address said readers - ‘ALL of
you - you proper Blacks, you half-Blacks, you wish -I- weren’t Blacks, Niggeroes and
Niggernes. You’. She invites her black audience to recognise themselves in the black
identity but also utilizes degrading terms used to suppress black people as a tool to rally
them together and empower one another.
In conclusion, the black poets in my anthology simultaneously convey the oppression and
struggle of black women but also celebrate the beauty of being black and a woman. There is
a sense of solidarity and sisterhood in black women creating a safe space to expand and
break literary conventions together. They showcase Black feminism as a militant force for
black liberation and are unapologetic about it, these poets leave no room for black women to
be perceived as silent spectators in the fight for equality. They place themselves in the
frontline for countless generations of black women to be inspired and encouraged through
their activism and literary voices.