bits and pieces from Word Warriors

Just a few of my favorite bits and pieces of poems from Word Warriors.

tell me you don't matter to a universe that conspired
to give you such a tongue, such rhythm
or rhythmless hips, such opposable thumbs--
give thanks or go home a waste of spark
speak or let the maker take back your throat
march or let the creator rescind your feet
dream or let your god destroy your good and fertile mind
this is your warning / this
your birthright / do not let
this universe regreat you.
--Marty McConnell from "instructions for a body"


Girl words the way girls word, the way pussies poem.
--Eve Ensler


the man's always had a plan
to slow down the velocity of a woman's journeys
to lower the volume of woman's voices
saying hush now honey be calm be still
the powers that be saying
there's an appropriate level for your grief and
there's a healthy range for your rage
and when woman exceeds
the emotional speed limit
society puts on the brakes
--Leah Harris from "revenge of the crazy wimmin"


she's wondering how many women are walking around this world
feeling the tingling of their amputated wings
remembering what it was to fly to sing
--Andrea Gibson rom "Blue Blanket"


praise the vens that river these wrists
praise the prolapsed valve in a heart
praise the scars marking a gallbladder absent
praise the rasp and rattle of functioning lungs
praise the prearthritic ache of elbows
and ankles
praise the lifeline sectioning a palm
praise the photographic pads of fingertips
praise the vulnerable dip at the base of a throat
praise the muscles surfacing on an abdomen
praise these arms that carry babies
and anthologies
praise the leg hairs that sprout
and are shaved
praise the ass that refuses to shrink
or be hidden
praise the cunt that bleeds
and accepts, bleeds
and accepts
praise the prominent ridge of nose
praise the strange convexity of ribcage
praise the single hair that insists on growing
from a right areola
praise the dent where the mole was clipped from the back
of a neck
praise these inner thighs brushing
praise these eyelashes that sometimes turn inward
praise these hips preparing to spread
into a grandmother's skirt
praise the beauty of the freckle
on the first knuckle of a left little finger
--Marty McConnell from "instructions for a body"