----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday, February 04, 2001 7:30
AM
Subject: I am woman, hear my
voice...
The female voice is
arbitrary. It has an opaque meaning.
It functions as a concept. In its form it is similar to other concepts
previously raised by poets, such as Charles Olson’s Projective Verse,
where the reader is meant to to feel the kinetic energy; to be ‘propelled
by the language of the poem to follow that track of energy down the page; to
experience the process by which the poet’s energy propelled him there in the first
place.’
For many women the stresses
of writing poetry in their true, female voice has led to the pressures of
imposed silence. Publication still exists in patriarchy and the demands of
patriarchy expect the quality of work to be like their male counterparts. They
expect universality in the material.
Therefore, establishing the
female voice is about undermining
patriarchy.
A
woman goes to poetry diminished by decade upon decade of patriarchal
dominance. She avoids writing in
her own language, avoids much of her victimization, suppressed anger, love,
desire, demands of children, chores, errands, fatigue, loss of contact with
her own being, redolent experience of place/landscape/world (eg. P.K.
Page’s poem Planet Earth) rape, incest, domestic violence and
passivism. Not all female poets, however, have this self-limitation. A
sustained energy, going in fear of rejection and a fire in the belly,
usually transcends passivity.
But, most female poets
hold back, and in order for acceptance (publication) write in the
traditional way or along with the status quo. The female poet loses herself
within the confines of language that has as Rich says, ‘a masculine persuasive
force.’
Adrienne Rich says in
‘When we dead Awaken’ – ‘to be a female human being trying to fulfill
traditional functions in a traditional way is in direct conflict with the
subversive function of the imagination. She goes on to say that ‘by
traditional she means conservative...
Women are often haunted by their womanly, energetic imagination... The
choices are to rebel and resist but usually the VOICE obeys. It is ruled
by the weight of an entirely dominant male society.’
Art will always be subject
to the confines and boundaries of an ambitious, dominant power. Therefore,
poetry is political. Female poets already occupying a
confident space on the bookshelves, with editors and in their
publishing house with several collections to their name can rest there.
They have choices, but there is no need for struggle, no need for change, no
need for activism!
The female voice is change,
it is persistence, it is anger, it is a new way of speaking, it is expression,
it is experience. It is a perception of what a woman knows, feels, needs,
wants, touches. It is something we all know and many
recognise.
My poem Let’s Belly
Roll has been rejected by Meanjin, The Southern Review, Island, and Siglo.
It is now published in an anthology called ,‘An Endless Afternoon.’ – an
anthology on birth and mothering - produced for women, by
women.
For Alison!
Let's belly roll
Echidna - Tachyglossus Aculeatus
prickly to begin with
and when approached
you belly roll
shoulder in a ball of silence
it's the same for me
except I rocked years
under the doona
perhaps that's our safety
leaf
when we're close to despots
you hatch a single
egg
a tongue licks your
breast &!
nbsp;
in childbirth I curled
screaming &nb!
sp;
with eyelids
closed !
even worse breast
feeding &nb!
sp;
was messy painful, brief
here we differ greatly
only in looks
my body hair is minimal
you have too much belly fur
I’m buried in paper leaves
your snout probes soil
my enemies live in tunnels
you eat them for
lunch
could we swap?
human forms have
ways
of tearing forests to
shreds !
it's like paring
flesh !
from ants
nests &!
nbsp;
and insect
wings &!
nbsp;
do you still live in a rock retreat?
if I look hard I might find you
buried in soft
sand
somewhere, afraid of me
Helen Hagemann
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