The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde

by Lorde, Audre

• ISBN13: 9780393319729
• ISBN10: 0393319725
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-02-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

"These are poems which blaze and pulse on the page."'”Adrienne Rich "The first declaration of a black, lesbian feminist identity took place in these poems, and set the terms'”beautifully, forcefully'”for contemporary multicultural and pluralist debate."'” Publishers Weekly "This is an amazing collection of poetry by . . . one of our best contemporary poets. . . . Her poems are powerful, often political, always lyrical and profoundly moving."'” Chuckanut Reader Magazine "What a deep pleasure to encounter Audre Lorde's most potent genius . . . you will welcome the sheer accessibility and the force and beauty of this volume."'” Out Magazine

Table of Contents

Editor's Note	p. xvii
Memorial II	p. 3
Die for All Mysterious Things	p. 4
A Family Resemblance	p. 5
Coal	p. 6
What My Child Learns of the Sea	p. 7
Now That I Am Forever with Child	p. 8
Bridge through My Windows	p. 9
Second Spring	p. 10
Spring III	p. 11
Gemini	p. 12
To a Girl Who Knew What Side Her Bread Was Buttered on	p. 13
Nightstone	p. 14
Father Son and Holy Ghost	p. 15
Pirouette	p. 16
Generation	p. 17
Echo	p. 18
Oaxaca	p. 19
Father, the Year is Fallen	p. 20
If You Come Softly	p. 21
Suffer the Children	p. 22
A Child Shall Lead	p. 23
A Lover's Song	p. 24
Return	p. 25
Suspension	p. 26
Rites of Passage	p. 29
Summer Oracle	p. 30
Song	p. 32
Spring People	p. 33
Rooming Houses Are Old Women	p. 34
Bloodbirth	p. 35
After a First Book	p. 36
Martha	p. 37
And What about the Children	p. 45
The Dozens	p. 46
The Woman Thing	p. 47
A Poem for a Poet	p. 48
Conversation in Crisis	p. 50
Sowing	p. 51
Making It	p. 52
On a Night of the Full Moon	p. 53
Fantasy and Conversation	p. 54
Dreams Bite	p. 55
For Each of You	p. 59
The Day They Eulogized Mahalia	p. 61
Equinox	p. 63
Progress Report	p. 65
Good Mirrors Are Not Cheap	p. 67
Black Mother Woman	p. 68
As I Grow Up Again	p. 69
The Seventh Sense	p. 70
New Year's Day	p. 71
Teacher	p. 72
Moving out or the End of Cooperative Living	p. 74
Moving in	p. 77
Neighbors	p. 78
Change of Season	p. 79
Generation II	p. 81
Love, Maybe	p. 82
Relevant is Different Points on the Circle	p. 83
Signs	p. 84
Conclusion	p. 85
A Song of Names and Faces	p. 87
Movement Song	p. 88
The Winds of Orisha	p. 90
Who Said It Was Simple	p. 92
Dear Toni Instead of a Letter of Congratulation upon Your Book and Your Daughter Whom You Say You Are Raising to Be a Correct Little Sister	p. 93
New York City 1970	p. 101
To My Daughter the Junkie on a Train	p. 103
To Desi as Joe as Smoky the Lover of Ii5th Street	p. 105
The American Cancer Society or There is More Than One Way to Skin a Coon	p. 107
A Sewerplant Grows in Harlem or I'm a Stranger Here Myself When Does the Next Swan Leave	p. 109
A Birthday Memorial to Seventh Street	p. 110
One Year to Life on the Grand Central Shuttle	p. 113
The Workers Rose on May Day or Postscript to Karl Marx	p. 114
Cables to Rage or I've Been Talking on This Street Corner a Hell of a Long Time	p. 115
Keyfood	p. 117
A Trip on the Staten Island Ferry	p. 119
My Fifth Trip to Washington Ended in Northeast Delaware	p. 120
Now	p. 121
To the Girl Who Lives in a Tree	p. 122
Barren	p. 124
Hard Love Rock #Ii	p. 125
Memorial IV	p. 126
Love Poem	p. 127
Mentor	p. 128
The Fallen	p. 129
Separation	p. 130
Even	p. 131
Memorial III from a Phone Booth on Broadway	p. 132
And Don't Think I Won't Be Waiting	p. 133
For My Singing Sister	p. 134
Monkeyman	p. 135
Naturally	p. 136
Song for a Thin Sister	p. 137
Release Time	p. 138
Revolution is One Form of Social Change	p. 139
Oya	p. 140
All Hallows Eve	p. 141
Ballad from Childhood	p. 142
Times Change and We Change with Them or We Seem to Have Lost Touch with Each Other	p. 143
To Marie, in Flight	p. 145
The Bees	p. 146
et-Nam Addenda	p. 147
sit to a City out of Time	p. 148
The Brown Menace or Poem to the Survival of Roaches	p. 149
Sacrifice	p. 151
Blackstudies	p. 153
Rites of Passage	p. 161
Father Son and Holy Ghost	p. 162
Coal	p. 163
Rooming Houses Are Old Women	p. 164
The Woman Thing	p. 165
Oaxaca	p. 166
Summer Oracle	p. 167
Generation	p. 169
A Family Resemblance	p. 170
Song	p. 171
On a Night of the Full Moon	p. 172
Now That I Am Forever with Child	p. 173
What My Child Learns of the Sea	p. 174
Spring People	p. 175
Poem for a Poet	p. 176
Story Books on a Kitchen Table	p. 179
Pirouette	p. 180
Hard Love Rock	p. 181
Father the Year Has Fallen	p. 182
Gemini	p. 183
Bridge through My Window	p. 184
Conversations in Crisis	p. 185
The Maiden	p. 186
When the Saints Come Marching in	p. 187
On Midsummer's Eve	p. 188
Dreams Bite	p. 189
Suspension	p. 190
A Child Shall Lead	p. 191
Afterlove	p. 192
The Dozens	p. 193
And What about the Children	p. 194
For the King and Queen of Summer	p. 195
Fantasy and Conversation	p. 196
Paperweight	p. 197
Martha	p. 198
Memorial I	p. 206
Memorial II	p. 207
The Songless Lark	p. 208
Anniversary	p. 209
Second Spring	p. 210
To a Girl Who Knew What Side Her Bread Was Buttered on	p. 211
Power	p. 215
School Note	p. 217
Solstice	p. 218
Scar	p. 220
Between Ourselves	p. 223
Outside	p. 226
A Woman/Dirge for Wasted Children	p. 228
The Black Unicorn	p. 233
A Woman Speaks	p. 234
From the House of Yemanjá	p. 235
Coniagui Women	p. 237
A Rock Thrown into the Water Does Not Fear the Cold	p. 238
Dahomey	p. 239
I25th Street and Abomey	p. 241
The Women of Dan Dance with Swords in Their Hands to Mark the Time When They Were Warriors	p. 242
Sahara	p. 243
Harriet	p. 245
Chain	p. 246
Sequelae	p. 249
For Assata	p. 252
At First I Thought You Were Talking about	p. 253
A Litany for Survival	p. 255
Meet	p. 257
Seasoning	p. 259
Touring	p. 260
Walking Our Boundaries	p. 261
Eulogy for Alvin Frost	p. 263
Chorus	p. 266
Coping	p. 267
To Martha: a New Year	p. 268
In Margaret's Garden	p. 269
Scar	p. 270
Portrait	p. 273
A Song for Many Movements	p. 274
Brother Alvin	p. 275
School Note	p. 276
Digging	p. 277
Outside	p. 279
Therapy	p. 281
The Same Death over and over or Lullabies Are for Children	p. 282
Ballad for Ashes	p. 283
A Woman/Dirge for Wasted Children	p. 284
Parting	p. 286
Timepiece	p. 287
Fog Report	p. 288
from Mother to Mother	p. 289
Death Dance for a Poet	p. 291
Dream/Songs from the Moon of Beulah Land I-V	p. 293
Recreation	p. 296
Woman	p. 297
Timing	p. 298
Ghost	p. 300
Artisan	p. 301
Letter for Jan	p. 302
Bicentennial Poem # 21,000,000	p. 304
The Old Days	p. 305
Contact Lenses	p. 306
Lightly	p. 307
Hanging Fire	p. 308
But What Can You Teach My Daughter	p. 309
From Inside an Empty Purse	p. 310
A Small Slaughter	p. 311
From the Greenhouse	p. 312
Journeystones I-xi	p. 313
About Religion	p. 316
Sister Outsider	p. 317
Bazaar	p. 318
Power	p. 319
Eulogy	p. 321
Never Take Fire from a Woman	p. 322
Between Ourselves	p. 323
Future Promise	p. 326
The Trollop Maiden	p. 327
Solstice	p. 328
A Glossary of African Names Used in the Poems	p. 330
The Evening News	p. 337
Za Ki Tan Ke Parlay Lot	p. 338
Afterimages	p. 339
A Poem for Women in Rage	p. 343
October	p. 346
Sister, Morning is a Time for Miracles	p. 347
Needa Choral of Black Women's Voices	p. 349
Sisters in Arms	p. 357
To the Poet Who Happens to Be Black and the Black Poet Who Happens to Be a Woman	p. 359
Outlines	p. 361
Stations	p. 367
Equal Opportunity	p. 369
Soho Cinema	p. 372
Vigil	p. 374
Berlin is Hard on Colored Girls	p. 375
This Urn Contains Earth from German Concentration Camps	p. 376
Mawu	p. 378
Fishing the White Water	p. 379
On the Edge	p. 381
Naming the Stories	p. 382
Diaspora	p. 383
The Horse Casts a Shoe	p. 384
Reins	p. 385
Wood Has No Mouth	p. 386
A Meeting of Minds	p. 387
The Art of Response	p. 388
From the Cave	p. 389
A Question of Climate	p. 390
Out to the Hard Road	p. 391
Every Traveler Has One Vermont Poem	p. 392
For Judith	p. 393
For Jose and Regina	p. 394
Beverly's Poem	p. 395
Big Apple Circus	p. 396
Florida	p. 397
Home	p. 399
Burning the Water Hyacinth	p. 400
Political Relations	p. 401
Learning to Write	p. 402
On My Way out I Passed over You and the Verrazano Bridge	p. 403
Out of the Wind	p. 407
Holographs	p. 408
There Are No Honest Poems about Dead Women	p. 409
A Question of Essence	p. 410
For the Record	p. 411
Ethiopia	p. 412
Generation III	p. 413
Never to Dream of Spiders	p. 414
Beams	p. 415
Call	p. 417
Smelling the Wind	p. 423
Legacy-hers	p. 424
Making Love to Concrete	p. 425
Echoes	p. 427
Domino	p. 428
Thaw	p. 429
Party Time	p. 430
Prism	p. 432
Do You Remember Laura	p. 433
Inheritance-his	p. 434
The One Who Got Away	p. 438
Depreciation	p. 439
Syracuse Airport	p. 440
Thanks to Jesse Jackson	p. 441
Judith's Fancy	p. 442
Production	p. 443
Building	p. 444
Jessehelms	p. 445
Dear Joe	p. 446
Women on Trains	p. 448
The Politics of Addiction	p. 451
Kitchen Linoleum	p. 452
Oshun's Table	p. 453
Parting	p. 454
Peace on Earth	p. 455
a Memorial-9/I8/9i	p. 456
Starting All over Again	p. 458
What It Means to Be Beautiful	p. 460
Hugo I	p. 461
Construction	p. 462
Speechless	p. 463
For Craig	p. 464
East Berlin	p. 465
The Night-Blooming Jasmine	p. 466
Girlfriend	p. 468
Lunar Eclipse	p. 469
Change	p. 470
Today is Not the Day	p. 471
The Electric Slide Boogie	p. 474
Index	p. 475
Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.