"Gretel" by Andrea Hollander Budy

While Monday might give most of us little to look forward too, we're lucky that it's Women's History Month! and we have a bit of poetry to help us through the day...

Gretel
by Andrea Hollander Budy

A woman is born to this:
sift, measure, mix, roll thin.

She learns the dough until
it folds into her skin and there is

no difference. Much later
she tries to lose it. Makes bets

with herself and wins enough
to keep trying. One day she begins

that long walk in unfamiliar woods.
She means to lose everything

she is. She empties her dark pockets,
dropping enough crumbs

to feed all the men who have ever
touched her or wished.

When she reaches the clearing
she is almost transparent—

so thin
the old woman in the house seizes

only the brother. You know the rest:
She won’t escape that oven. She’ll eat

the crumbs meant for him, remember
something of his touch, reach

for the sifter and the cup.

Found at: http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/175.html

"Phenomenal Woman" by Maya Angelou

Obviously we can't get very far into our women and poetry month without looking at this poem. You may have read it 20 times before or even took a test on it, but one of the great things about most poetry is that it's not long so take a minute and read it again...

Phenomenal Woman
by Maya Angelou Maya Angelou

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms,
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them,
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing,
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need for my care.
’Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Found at: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=178942

"What Do Women Want?" by Kim Addonizio

It's our month of women and poetry! And I've been saving this poem just for the occasion...

"What Do Women Want?"
by Kim Addonizio

I want a red dress.
I want it flimsy and cheap,
I want it too tight, I want to wear it
until someone tears it off me.
I want it sleeveless and backless,
this dress, so no one has to guess
what's underneath. I want to walk down
the street past Thrifty's and the hardware store
with all those keys glittering in the window,
past Mr. and Mrs. Wong selling day-old
donuts in their café, past the Guerra brothers
slinging pigs from the truck and onto the dolly,
hoisting the slick snouts over their shoulders.
I want to walk like I'm the only
woman on earth and I can have my pick.
I want that red dress bad.
I want it to confirm
your worst fears about me,
to show you how little I care about you
or anything except what
I want. When I find it, I'll pull that garment
from its hanger like I'm choosing a body
to carry me into this world, through
the birth-cries and the love-cries too,
and I'll wear it like bones, like skin,
it'll be the goddamned
dress they bury me in.

Found at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/16213

"the lost women" by Lucille Clifton

Hurrah!! March is Women’s History Month which means we’ll be looking at a variety of women poets, past and present. I’m so excited! The idea is to find mostly poems written about women by women. To get the month of women and poetry off to a good start, Lucille Clifton will do the trick...

the lost women
by Lucille Clifton

i need to know their names
those women i would have walked with
jauntily the way men go in groups
swinging their arms, and the ones
those sweating women whom i would have joined
after a hard game to chew the fat
what would we have called each other laughing
joking into our beer? where are my gangs,
my teams, my mislaid sisters?
all the women who could have known me,
where in the world are their names?

Found at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/21309

"Ode to a Dressmaker's Dummy" by Donald Justice

February’s not over and so in keeping with the love theme, we move into odes. If you are a detail person (like many poetry readers are), visit http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5784 for a short history and definition of the ode. You’ll probably want to argue with me that an ode is not the same as a love poem and want the facts to back it up. I’ll agree that technically it’s not. But then I'll ask you how you define a love poem. Odes, for me anyway, fit right in. And might be even more interesting because you can write an ode to just about anything. Think about it and you might agree that taking the time to admire and poetically define an object, to write it an ode, feels a little bit like love.

Ode to a Dressmaker's Dummy
by Donald Justice

Papier-mache body; blue-and-black cotton jersey cover.
Metal stand. Instructions included. --Sears, Roebuck Catalogue

O my coy darling, still
You wear for me the scent
Of those long afternoons we spent,
The two of us together,
Safe in the attic from the jealous eyes
Of household spies
And the remote buffooneries of the weather;
So high,
Our sole remaining neighbor was the sky,
Which, often enough, at dusk,
Leaning its cloudy shoulders on the sill,
Used to regard us with a bored and cynical eye.

How like the terrified,
Shy figure of a bride
You stood there then, without your clothes,
Drawn up into
So classic and so strict a pose
Almost, it seemed, our little attic grew
Dark with the first charmed night of the honeymoon.
Or was it only some obscure
Shape of my mother's youth I saw in you,
There where the rude shadows of the afternoon
Crept up your ankles and you stood
Hiding your sex as best you could?--
Prim ghost the evening light shone through.

Found at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15353

"Hate Poem" by Julie Sheehan

Because the the oppisite of the love poem is...

Hate Poem
by Julie Sheehan

I hate you truly. Truly I do.
Everything about me hates everything about you.
The flick of my wrist hates you.
The way I hold my pencil hates you.
The sound made by my tiniest bones were they trapped
in the jaws of a moray eel hates you.
Each corpuscle singing in its capillary hates you.

Look out! Fore! I hate you.

The blue-green jewel of sock lint I’m digging
from under my third toenail, left foot, hates you.
The history of this keychain hates you.
My sigh in the background as you explain relational databases
hates you.
The goldfish of my genius hates you.
My aorta hates you. Also my ancestors.

A closed window is both a closed window and an obvious
symbol of how I hate you.

My voice curt as a hairshirt: hate.
My hesitation when you invite me for a drive: hate.
My pleasant “good morning”: hate.

You know how when I’m sleepy I nuzzle my head
under your arm? Hate.
The whites of my target-eyes articulate hate. My wit
practices it.
My breasts relaxing in their holster from morning
to night hate you.
Layers of hate, a parfait.
Hours after our latest row, brandishing the sharp glee of hate,
I dissect you cell by cell, so that I might hate each one
individually and at leisure.
My lungs, duplicitous twins, expand with the utter validity
of my hate, which can never have enough of you,
Breathlessly, like two idealists in a broken submarine.

Found at: http://poemsoutloud.net/audio/archive/julie_sheehan_reads_hate_poem/

"i carry your heart with me" by E.E. Cummings

A belated happy Valentine's to everyone. I meant to post this yesterday but lost track of the day. Too many chocolates to eat and cards to send. Anyway, it's a very popular poem so you've probably heard it before but it's still one of my favorites and worth posting. Happy Valentine's!

i carry your heart with me by E. E. Cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

Found at: http://www.famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/e__e__cummings/poems/14130