to read if you plan on just casually perusing poetry, Her poems are painful, but in a wonderfully cathartic way, god, I love audre lorde, I don't want to give Our Dead Behind Us less than three, but I didn't understand most of the poems in this book.
Since I didn't understand, I'm going to defer from casting any judgments about the quality of this work, Well, I finally finished. I can honestly say that I am not that big of an Audre Lorde, I don't know if I picked the wrong book to start reading her works or what but I had a hard time grasping the meaning of several of her poems.
I had to do some research or should I say a lot of research to get the meaning behind the poems.
Just not my kind of poetry, I don't know if this will be the only works that I read from her but this is not my cup of tea.
Reading about Lorde I found out she is a fighter and she stood for what she believed in and went to great levels to make a stance for what she felt strongly about and for that I appreciate her as a strong individual.
Gorgeous Poesia forte, potente, de resistência e existência, Negra, feminina, lésbica, intersseccional, vibrante, In case you missed it, the world's at war, And as chroniclers of these conflicts go, you can't get much better than Audre Lorde, This later collection is one powerful poem after another, revealing her mastery at crafting unforgettable lines and images whether she's addressing womanhood "Stations", South African politics "Holographs" or a fertility goddess "Call".
As Lorde herself asks," so where is true history written / except in poems" and who are we to doubt her, Her book is a testament to that fact, “Black people fishing the causeway
fullskirted bare brown to the bellyband
atilt on the railing near a concrete road
where a crawlertransporter will move
the space shuttle from hangar to gantry.
Renting a biplane to stalk the full moon in Aquarius
as she rose under Venus between propellers Country Western surf
feasting on frozen black beans Cubano from Grand Union
in the mangrove swamp elbows of cypress scrub oak
Moon moon moon on the syncopated road
rimey with bullfrogs walking beaches fragrant and raunchy
firedamp sand between my toes.
Huge arrogant cockroaches with white peoples manners
and their palmetto bug cousins
aggressive ridged slowness
the obstinacy of living fossils.
Sweet uglyfruit avocados tomatoes
and melon in the mango slot
hibiscus spread like a rainbow of lovers
arced stamens waving
but even the jacaranda only last a day.
Crescent moon walking my sheets at midnight
lonely in the palmetto thicket counting
persistent Canaveral lizards launch themselves
through my air conditioner
chasing equally determined fleas.
In Gainesville the last time there was only one
sister present who said “Im gonna remember your name
and the next time you come therell be
quite a few more of us, hear”
and there certainly was a warm pool
of dark womens faces
in the sea of listening.
The first thing I did when I got home
after kissing my honey
was to wash my hair with small flowers
and begin a fiveday fast.
”
Thoughts: The language in this collection is so lush my red pen bracketed too many lines to count.
The above is titled Florida, and its officially my second favorite poem about my home state Elizabeth Bishops remains the tops, probably forever.
Til tider overvejer jeg om der kursus i hvordan man læser digte
Andre gange læser jeg digte uden problemer
Selvom det var svært digte samling at kommer igennem, på grund af sproget, at det en lærerig og spændende oplevelser!
Lorde is a lauded poet published by a major house, so I assume her quality.
I must have a blind spot when it comes to her work, I did not like a single poem in this collection, I disliked different poems for one of three reasons,
The first are poems I do not understand, After multiple readings, I do not believe the author gives us enough information for these poems to make sense, Perhaps some words are coded for those in the know
She has a way of treating the mundane as if it is momentous.
Perhaps it is, but it was not often clear why,
Then there are the poems I quite liked until the last few lines, at which point Lorde takes it in another direction that seems unwarranted by all that came before.
I presume this new direction is really the point, but in no instance did it seem better to me,
I hope that you can enjoy Lorde's work, for I cannot, This collection feels similar to how the lungs, after exhaling the breath into that place of discomfort, to then inhale deeply.
Many of the poems address the memories and intersections of blackness, childhood, the future, and the present, Some are whimsical, some heartbearing, some throwing you into the realities of identity, Powerful stuff.
And such a broad geography/timeline of women it covers, You know, since she was a Black, female, lesbian poet who faced cancer etc etc and had such eyes on the world:
".
. .
Some women
wait for themselves
Around the next corner
And call the empty spot peace
But the opposite of living
Is only not living
And the do not care.
Some women wait for something
To change and nothing
Does change
So they change
Themselves.
" "Some women wait for something to change and nothing does change so they change themselves"
"I am bleak heroism of words that refuse to be buried alive with the liars"
"I may be a weed in the garden of women I have loved"Min favoritpoet, hands down.
“Jag mins inte orden i min första dikt
Men jag minns löftet
Jag gav min penna
Att aldrig låta den
Ligga
I någon annans blod”
Audre Lorde black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet This was probably much better than I think, because I didn't understand much of it with my English.
I really wish there was a Finnish translation, A powerful volume.
This was is favorite piece from the collection:
Stations
Some women love
to wait
for life for a ring
in the June light for a touch
of the sun to heal them for another
woman's voice to make them whole
to untie their hands
put words in their mouths
form to their passages
sound
to their screams for some other sleeper
to remember their future
their past.
Some women wait tor their right
train
in the wrong station
in the alleys of morning
for the noon to holler
the night come down.
Some women wait for love
to rise up
the child of their promise
to gather from earth
what they do not plant
to claim pain for labor
to become
the tip of an arrow to aim
at the heart of now
but it never stays.
Some women wait for visions
that do not return
where they were not welcome
naked
for invitations to places
they always wanted
to visit
to be repeated.
Some women wait for themselves
around the next corner
and call the empty spot peace
but the opposite of living
is only not living
and the do not care.
Some women wait for something
to change
and nothing
does change
so they change
themselves.
"I cannot recall the words of my first poem
but I remember a promise
I made my pen
never to leave it
lying
in somebody else's blood" There's a lot of depth to this book and I'm not that deep lol so though I got the general idea and flow of this book I was veryyy confused.
It was a very difficult read for me This is my introduction to Audre Lorde's writing, and, though this collection was a tad overly political in nature for me, I still found my way to the juicy parts of her poetry.
On writing:
I cannot recall the words of my first poem
but I remember a promise
I made my pen
never to leave it
lying
in somebody else's blood.
On women:
Some women wait for something
to change
and nothing
does change
so they change
themselves.
On the differences of opinions:
Tanned boys I do not know
on their first proud harvest
wave from their father's tractor
one smiles as we drive past
the other hollers
nigger
into cropped and fragrant air.
On love:
I dream
I am precious rock
touching the edge of you
that needs
the moon's loving.
On living:
What do we want from each other
after we have told our stories
do we want
to be healed
do we want
mossy quiet stealing over our scars
do we want
the powerful unfrightening sister
who will make the pain go away
mother's voice in the hallway
you've done it right
the first time, darling,
you will never need
to do it again.
On death:
Part of our secret lay hidden
in Monday's pocket for comfort:
we always go back
to our graves.
first poetry book i ever liked As Marilyn Hacker has written, "Black, lesbian, mother, cancer survivor, urban woman: none of Lorde's selves has ever silenced the others the counterpoint among them is often the material of her strongest poems.
"
Yet anotherfor an Audre Lorde poetry collection! She's breaking all kind of records for me here, but I should no longer be surprised.
The previous few collections have felt raw and powerful, and this one feels the same, but in a different waymaybe cozy in its language somehow, and, as another reviewer mentions, Lorde really focuses on the little things in life heresmall moments that, by themselves are not much, but in Lorde's hands they become part of a bigger story, and it's really beautiful what she does with words.
Anyway. I feel like as I move through her work I'm losing the ability to describe each collection in new ways, but that Audre Lorde never would have.
.
Get Started On Our Dead Behind Us: Poems Conceived By Audre Lorde Compiled As Printable Format
Audre Lorde