Audre Lorde
One of the most exciting poets I was able to discover was an influential Black lesbian social feminist--Audre Lorde. She was out and open about her sexuality and played a big part on advocating second-wave feminism and speaking out on Black rights simultaneously. This is where the term Womanism, the originator seeming to be Alice Walker, started to form as many Black women came to realize that feminism catered to white women while turning a blind eye to women of color, specifically Black women.
Speak earth and bless me with what is richest
make sky flow honey out of my hips rigis mountains spread over a valley carved out by the mouth of rain. And I knew when I entered her I was high wind in her forests hollow fingers whispering sound honey flowed from the split cup impaled on a lance of tongues on the tips of her breasts on her navel and my breath howling into her entrances through lungs of pain. Greedy as herring-gulls or a child I swing out over the earth over and over again.
This poem was published in 1975 about an intimate love interaction between Lorde and another woman. In the 70s, sexuality was still taboo and seen as “white evil” in Black communities, but Lorde was very open on her sexuality in her writings and everywhere she could verbalize her intersectionality (Bowles). In a time women were told to sit back and be quiet--let the men do the work--Audre did the complete opposite, and really sealed the deal when publishing her battle with cancer.
