On Marrying the Man of Every Woman’s Dreams

So, here it is - my first cheating-man poem.

Comments please!!

On Marrying the Man of Every Woman’s Dreams
BY Susan Baba

At first, you will think that you are important too.
Out of the many, he has chosen only you.
He will praise your beauty,
your soft hands,
your mermaid eyes.
He will call you the moon and stars
and you will believe him.
He will make you feel confident and poised
as he lightly holds your elbow,
to steer you through the crowds.
You will sit on park benches, restaurant booths, church pews
side by side.
You will both point to young and silly things
walking by, all short skirts and flirtatious longing
who think they have only their bodies to offer the world
But he -
he will praise your mind
your heart
your ability to always dress appropriately for the occasion
and he will seem to look inside of you and love you all the more.

Soon you will see that he is more important.
As your star peaks and begins its descent,
his will still be rocketing onward.
You will still be by his side.
He will still lead you by elbow through the crowd
of his adoring business associates and political allies
but he will not offer to get you a drink
or introduce you to his friends.
He will not even look at you

He will begin to work later now,
joke about the life of a “big man,”
promise to make up for missed engagements,
forgotten anniversaries.
But he will not.

You will try to ignore your senses,
but you will begin to feel small.
He will spend weekends away now.
He will know his children’s voices
from many phone conversations
But will always look on with astonishment
at how quickly they have grown.

You will wonder about his request that you never call him first,
about his sudden out of town trips
that seem to become more frequent,
but, you will not complain.
He will placate you with the reassurance that this is all done for your good.
It is what he must do to keep you wearing couture and driving luxury cars

Your eyes will scan the tennis bracelet on your wrist,
the vast expanse of home the two of you built together.
You will never tell him that you would give it all up
for the way things were.
You will want to,
but you will
not
say
a thing.

Think Only Nigerian Men Cheat?

I've been thinking a lot about cheating lately. Not considering cheating, but contemplating the "why" of it. Why do people cheat? Specifically, why does the person cheated on make the decision to stay?

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie tried to address this question in "Imitation," one of many stories in her beautiful collection of short stories The Thing Around Your Neck. "Imitation" follows a middle aged Nigerian woman named Nkem who learns that her husband has a girlfriend in Nigeria. She lives in the US, for the children’s sake, while her husband is a prominent businessman abroad. Nkem grew up with nothing, so she was at first honored to now be able to afford a new life for her children. But, when she hears about her husband's apparent infidelity, she contemplates her next move and has to decide whether she will stay in the US, and live a comfortable but lonely life, or return to Nigeria and fight for what is hers.

Sadly, the story’s plot was not unfamiliar to me. In my small Cincinnati Nigerian community, it was common place to hear about this man or that man running the town with some other woman. No one batted an eye or seemed to act surprised when the "man" turned out to be their own husband. No one ever spoke of confronting him or keying the heck out of his car or, better yet, filing for divorce. The women would always just shake their head and say, "Thought he was different, but it seems that all Nigerian men are the same."

It took me a while to realize that extramarital affairs are not exclusive to Nigerian men. Politicians, celebs, and everyday people are ignoring their wedding vows on the regular. The most surprising thing, though, is that despite decades of women’s empowerment, the women usually take back their cheating spouses. I would like to think that I would go all Elizabeth Edwards on my man and blow his whole spot up or embrace my inner Candi Stanton and proclaim "I don't mind if he's getting some loving from you, as long as he takes care of home," but I would likely be more like Freida Khalo. I imagine that I would retreat within myself and mourn quietly. Finding out that my husband had been unfaithful would probably crush everything that I am.

Anyway, the topic of women who stay is a very fascinating one to me, so I decided to write a poem about it. "On Marrying the Man of Every Woman’s Dreams" is about a woman who has found neither the courage to confront nor the strength to leave.

Let me know what you think.

Not Hallows Eve, But Close

Though this poem has nothing to do with Halloween, it reminds me so much of hauntings - of a wanton and wandering woman who have forgotten where she is going and where she is from...I have been her kind before.

Her Kind
BY Anne Sexton

I have gone out, a possessed witch,
haunting the black air, braver at night;
dreaming evil, I have done my hitch
over the plain houses, light by light:
lonely thing, twelve-fingered, out of mind.
A woman like that is not a woman, quite.
I have been her kind.


I have found the warm caves in the woods,
filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves,
closets, silks, innumerable goods;
fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves:
whining, rearranging the disaligned.
A woman like that is misunderstood.
I have been her kind.


I have ridden in your cart, driver,
waved my nude arms at villages going by,
learning the last bright routes, survivor
where your flames still bite my thigh
and my ribs crack where your wheels wind.
A woman like that is not ashamed to die.
I have been her kind.

Essence Magazine's 40 Favorite Poets

To celebrate Essence Magazine's 40th Anniversary, they've posted a list of their favorite Black poetesses. It's a pretty fabulous list filled lots of heavy hitters of the word-space - Phillis Wheatley, Audre Lorde, Elizabeth Alexander, Maya Angelou, Lucille Clifton...the list goes on an on. My favorite part is that they included little snippets of the most famous pieces of each poet. I've included the ones I absolutely adored below. Of course they are love poems...you know me all too well:-)

Enjoy! Check out the full list here.


Did This Happen To Your Mother? Did Your Sister Throw Up A Lot?
BY Alice Walker

“I thought love would adapt itself to my needs.
But needs grow too fast;
they come up like weeds.
Through cracks in the conversation.
Through silences in the dark.”


Loving Again
BY Gloria Wade-Gayles

“Last night
we loved as if the gods
had announced only to us
that they sky would fall
while we slept."

God Made Adam Before He MADE Eve

"Respect yourself by respecting me"

We Follow Your Lead
BY Cheryl 'Salt' James

Women Everywhere Look Just Like Her?

I was planning on ranting on and on about the objectification of women of color in America. About the decades of media propaganda that have allowed little but half-bakes caricatures of Chinese/ Latina/ Brazilian/ Ethiopian/ Caribbean / bi-racial/ (insert any non-white group of) women to dominate our popular culture. About the ignorance of the word "exotic," when applied to people, and of the cultural/ sexual hierarchy that it creates. But I decided against it...this time.

Instead, I will let Suheir Hammad speak for me:-)

A recent conversation with a friend reminded me of how much I ::HEART:: this piece!! And, in typical Suheir style, "Not Your Exotic, Not Your Erotic" is both fierce and tender. Wonderfully written and beautifully performed. She quickly cuts to the heart of the matter in a way that only she can.

Listen closely and open your hearts.

"don’t wanna be your exotic
some dark, fragile, colorful bird
imprisoned
caged in a land foreign to the stretch of her wings

don’t wanna be your exotic
women everywhere look just like me
some taller, darker, nicer than me
but like me just the same

women everywhere carry my nose on their faces
my name on their spirits

don’t seduce yourself with my other-ness"
(full text)

FREE* As in freedom

My church is starting a new series called Free, so I'm totally on a "freedom" kick right now. It's such an over-used term, especially in America, but what the heck does it really mean? Does it mean being able to pursue whatever path, without judgment and reproach? Or does it deal more with the internal state of thing? With the relationship between our internal sense and our outward persona? What role does our faith play in helping us unlock its door?

::le sigh:: Trying to understand what freedom means in absolute...what it can mean in my life, is no simple feat. So, until I get some better answers, here's a little piece by famous Ohioan Rita Dove, to noddle your brain on:-)

In this poem, Dove describes freedom more as outward eccentricity, without really touching on the cosmic question of how we are to perceive it. None the less, it's a fantastic read! With lines like, "she who has brought mercy back into the streets/ and will not retire politely to the potter's field," what's not to love?

Be sure to read this one slowly...and savor the words!

Lady Freedom Among Us
BY Rita Dove

don't lower your eyes
or stare straight ahead to where
you think you ought to be going
don't mutter oh no
not another one
get a job fly a kite
go bury a bone
with her oldfashioned sandals
with her leaden skirts
with her stained cheeks and whiskers and
heaped up trinkets


she has risen among us in blunt reproach
she has fitted her hair under a hand-me-down cap
and spruced it up with feathers and stars
slung over her shoulder she bears
the rainbowed layers of charity and murmurs
all of you even the least of you
don't cross to the other side of the square
don't think another item to fit on a
tourist's agenda
consider her drenched gaze her shining brow
she who has brought mercy back into the streets
and will not retire politely to the potter's field
having assumed the thick skin of this town
its gritted exhaust its sunscorch and blear
she rests in her weathered plumage
bigboned resolute

don't think you can ever forget her
don't even try
she's not going to budge
no choice but to grant her space
crown her with sky
for she is one of the many
and she is each of us

© Rita Dove. From On the Bus With Rosa Parks (W.W. Norton & Company).

Kicking Down Color Lines, Busting through Glass Ceilings

It wasn't until I read Anthony Walton's article "Double-Bind: Three Women of the Harlem Renaissance" that I realized how truly absent the female voice has been from our contemporary understanding of the poetic Harlem Renaissance. And, it is not that it didn't exist. Quite the contrary. Many women lit up both page and stage with beautiful words of struggle, progress, and the human condition. It is only that their status as women, black women, at that (what Walton refers to as the "double bind") made it difficult for them to get the respect and acclaim they deserved.

Well, I will do my part to keep their legacy alive!!

Thanks to Walton for getting me hip to these three feminine voices of the Harlem Renaissance. Hope you enjoy these short but powerful piece! And remember, the best way to keep this train moving is to share the love. Pass these poems along.



Dead Fires
BY Jessie Redmon Fauset

If this is peace, this dead and leaden thing,
Then better far the hateful fret, the sting.
Better the wound forever seeking balm
Than this gray calm!

Is this pain's surcease? Better far the ache,
The long-drawn dreary day, the night's white wake,
Better the choking sigh, the sobbing breath
Than passion's death!

Black Woman
BY Georgia Douglas Johnson

Don’t knock at the door, little child,
I cannot let you in,
You know not what a world this is
Of cruelty and sin.
Wait in the still eternity
Until I come to you,
The world is cruel, cruel, child,
I cannot let you in!

Don’t knock at my heart, little one,
I cannot bear the pain
Of turning deaf-ear to your call
Time and time again!
You do not know the monster men
Inhabiting the earth,
Be still, be still, my precious child,
I must not give you birth!

Quatrains
BY Gwendolyn Bennett

1
Brushes and paints are all I have
To speak the music in my soul—
While silently there laughs at me
A copper jar beside a pale green bowl.

2
How strange that grass should sing—
Grass is so still a thing ...
And strange the swift surprise of snow
So soft it falls and slow.