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"...gender essentialism is a diversion from looking at how our actions are shaped by our cultural histories and our bigotries." I agree Christopher, (I think!) and offer the following poem as an example of a poetic response - an _action_ shaped, not by gender, but by the _cultural history_ (in this case, Palestinian) experience of the writer. That the poet is female, invites a separate theoretical reading which for me is an unnecessary diversion from the poetry. DEPARTURE by May Sayigh - palestinian poet In this moment of departure, point your red arrows, disarm the lightning, and open wide the gate to my exile. Close the sky's open face, and ride away. I long so deeply that the shores unfold their seas and horses bolt! Now I'll carry the roads and palm trees in my suitcase, I'll lock my tears in the evening's copybooks and seal the seasons. Let's begin our song: here is Beirut wearing you like her own clothes. You must sit well on the surface of her glory abandoning tears In her blue froth She contains you like eternity like the sense of beginning that comes with certainty -How can you be dead, yet so absolutely present ? Let the rivers abandon their skies, and the seas dry out ! Everything in the universe has an end except my spilt blood... Each time I think of it You remain as large as your death. The war planes choose you, discover you, plant their blackness in you. From all those clouded last visions, how will you begin the story of harvest? We planes select you, at the start of your sleep, at the end of your sleep. How often did the sky explode over you with hatred? How often were you taken aside? How many massacres did you survive ? Now you collect all the wounds, taking refuge with death, wearing dreams as wings. Interestingly, a review of Darwish's first collection in exile, Uhibbuki aw la Uhibbuki (I love you, I love you not, 1972)also picks up key terms of "wounds" and "death". "...words, pictures, memory, and dreams join those of wounds and death as key terms in Darwish's poetic diction. In the working of dream and memory the body of the beloved female blends imperceptibly with that of the homeland until they become virtually indistinguishable." Quote taken from Encyclopedia Of The Palestinians: Biography of Mahmoud Darwish to be found at: http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/al-Birwa/Story170.html Information on May Sayigh can be found at: http://www.sakakini.org/first.html Regards Maria Fletcher