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Ulises Mendez
ENL 3, SQ 2014
CRA 2
Tim Kreiner
Analysis of “Coal” by Audre Lorde
Audre Lorde’s poem has a very unique and intriguing name: “Coal”. Coal is the most widely used fossil fuel for energy production. Similarly, it is made up of the same thing as diamonds (which are a prominent metaphor throughout the poem) yet the two are strikingly physically different. It is imperative to note, however, that both coal and the poem’s speaker are the same color: black. The speaker, most likely Lorde herself, addresses obstacles faced by the black community and, more importantly herself. Nonetheless, it is this prominent blackness, something so natural to which negative connotations and labels have been assigned to by society, that empowers her and allows her to seek who she truly is as a person despite society’s norms and expectations.
Lorde’s poem is broken down into three stanzas, each corresponding to a separate aspect of her life. The first stanza corresponds to her race; the second stanza corresponds to the hardships she faces; the third stanza corresponds to her personal and intimate life.
As previously stated, the poem’s first stanza coincides with the speaker’s race and identity. In her first and second lines Lorde loosely associates herself with the rest of the black community, stating that she “is the total black” (2). However, physically separating “I” from “total black” parallels Lorde’s own separation from others in the black community. She states that she’s “from the earth’s inside” which mirrors the black community’s repression by the rest of the world, namely American society. In line 4 it is important to note Lorde’s purpose of the word ‘open’, “There are many kinds of open”; she is referring to that which is kno...
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...ers,” ready to come out at any moment and kill their intended prey (16-17). On the other hand, there are those that are waiting for the right moment to “explode through [her] lips” and when they do, she will be “like young sparrows bursting from shell”: with mouth wide open, allowing everyone to know what she feels and thinks (19-20). Lastly, Lorde concludes the stanza by stating that there are words that she just does not understand and torment her, which connects to the first line in the following and final stanza.
In the poem’s final stanza Lorde begins with “love is a word, another kind of open” (23). Even though Lorde asserts that “love” is another form of freedom and something which is presumably well-defined, we see that it is in fact not because of her subsequent use of punctuation after “open”, which had not been done in her previous uses of the word.
It is very clear that the narrator is aggravated with the ignorance of some people as they assume she is supposed to sound different than she does because she is black. To emphasize her agitation throughout the poem, the narrator asks rhetorical questions such as; "Was I supposed to sound lazy, dropping syllables here, there, not finishing words but slurring the final letter so that each sentence joined the next, sliding past the listener? Were certain words off limits, too erudite, too scholarly for someone with a natural tan? And Does everyone in your family speak alike?"
When the sixth stanza states that “She owns them, no one will admit what they cannot/ come close to must own them.” (24-25); it’s talking about the lady being an inexplicable legend. She captures the mind of the average person. She enthralls these people so much that they pursuit her every move, to understand her. She lets them come with her, on her journey. The people she brings with her are there for her body. Not her personality, or for herself. To the people who chase her, it’s just a quick
Not only is this a beautiful example of her rhyme but also a great illustration of her ability to imagine and recreate a scene, it feels as though you yourself are leaping and bounding to freedom as you read this. In lines 17-20 a questioning of how she will define herself once she escapes arises, she asks if she can truly call herself an American. Beautifully saying,
In the last stanza it is explained how, even when she was a child, she
... middle of paper ... ... Although the forces of the world may be unknowable and at times painful, she is at peace with them. She has found true love, which has enabled her to find her voice.
The fact that Lorde faces so many hardships throughout the novel, results in her inability to gain self-confidence and therefore integrate. In the beginning of the novel, the reader sees Lorde as a loner; it is not until she meets women who influence her life that she begins to self-integrate. As a child, Lorde does not have many friends. She is isolated and feels that she is very different from those around her. She spends a lot of time with her mother, who she feels does not understand her, or allows her to meet a support network. Lorde's mother's isolation is one example of someone does not understand her lifestyle and therefore cannot giver her support. This is a form of discrimination, and one of the hardships that Audre faced her in adolescence and will continue to face for the rest of her life. It is not until see meets women that can relate to her life style that she feels she become a more complete person: "Recreating in words the women who helped give me substance" (255). As Lorde begins to meet friends an...
On the second stanza, the woman was haunted by the voices of her child in her mind. She said that under the circumstance she is right now, she has no choice but to have a abortion. Then she express her feeling and felt sorry about what she had done. “And your lives from your unfinished reach, If I stole your births and your names, Your straight baby tears and your games” (Gwendolyn Brooks) she show remorse that she stolen her child life and her child would get to experience the first tear and games. So now her baby already going through death.
...is presented in a way that “blacks or whites can draw admonition from the subject” (1) . Another perspective from Revell is that the poem presents itself in terms of passionate personal regret. Revell believes that Dunbar felt guilty because he allowed himself to be bound to the “ plantation lifestyle” (1). The plantation life style internal anguish and agony the blacks went through as slaves. Some blacks have moved on from it, but some continue to use slavery as an excuse to not progress in life. It should be noted that Revell draws the most attention to the middle of the poem. The poem itself is masked because it never specifically says who its linked too, even though most would infer that it is linked to the black race. Revell concludes that Dunbar left aside the preconceived image of what it meant to be black in America, and spoke “only from his heart” (1) .
In other words, Carbado meant to prove that not only Black women fit into this definition of intersectionality, and therefore there are other groups of people, aside from Black women, who can share their same experiences. Carbado’s theory about gender and colorblind intersectionality comes close to being able to explain Audrey Lorde’s understanding of the Black women identity. But applying Carbado’s theory it becomes more inclusive towards other oppressed groups of people, and it highlights Carbado’s expansion of intersectionality within Lorde’s essay.
The contradiction of being both black and American was a great one for Hughes. Although this disparity was troublesome, his situation as such granted him an almost begged status; due to his place as a “black American” poet, his work was all the more accessible. Hughes’ black experience was sensationalized. Using his “black experience” as a façade, however, Hughes was able to obscure his own torments and insecurities regarding his ambiguous sexuality, his parents and their relationship, and his status as a public figure.
In both “The Fourth of July” and “Black Men and Public Space” the narrators did one very important thing; they expressed how the encounter made the narrator feel. This is crucial because it almost allows the reader to share the feeling of helplessness that was felt. In “The Fourth of July”, Lorde explained how she truly did not understand why the family was treated differently. She tells of her parents’ fruitless effort to shield their children from the harsh realities of Jim Crow by planning out virtually the whole trip. The highlight of the story is when the narrator expresses both anger and confusion at the fact that her family was denied seated service at an ice cream parlor because they were black.
‘’The woman thing’’ by Audre Lorde reflects more on her life as a woman, this poem relates to the writers work and also has the theme of feminism attached it. The writers role in this poem is to help the women in discovering their womanhood just as the title say’s ‘’the woman thing.’’ The poem is free verse and doesn’t have a rhyme to it and has twenty-five lines.
It is a way to crucially engage oneself in setting the stage for new interventions and connections. She also emphasized that she personally viewed poetry as the embodiment of one’s personal experiences, and she challenged what the white, European males have imbued in society, as she declared, “I speak here of poetry as the revelation or distillation of experience, not the sterile word play that, too often, the white fathers distorted the word poetry to mean — in order to cover their desperate wish for imagination without insight.”
This, in fact, is an example of “dynamic decomposition” of which the speaker claims she understands nothing. The ironic contradiction of form and content underlines the contradiction between the women’s presentation of her outer self and that of her inner self. The poem concludes with the line “’Let us go home she is tired and wants to go to bed.’” which is a statement made by the man. Hence, it “appears to give the last word to the men” but, in reality, it mirrors the poem’s opening lines and emphasises the role the woman assumes on the outside as well as her inner awareness and criticism. This echoes Loy’s proclamation in her “Feminist Manifesto” in which she states that women should “[l]eave off looking to men to find out what [they] are not [but] seek within [themselves] to find out what [they] are”. Therefore, the poem presents a “new woman” confined in the traditional social order but resisting it as she is aware and critical of
I did think it was going to be a story about her, so this defiantly was more interesting than I excepted. The main message I got from Lorde’s story and how this women struggled with being silent, is that being silent is going to protect you or help one come over their fears, instead people should over come this fear and speak up to whatever they need to speak up about, this to was seen as her main message in this text because later on, Lorde explains how she’s regret her decision in the past by being so silent, and how others will regret too if they don’t give this message more profound thought. So this was unique read because she was a black lesbian poet, which is incredible since the stigma in society around black people and sexual orientation. Relating this to this article, in today’s society I feel like many people stay silent because they are scared worrying about what people may say or think about them, especially being in the 20th century were everyone practically has some sort of profile on the internet, this makes it much easier for people to get targeted easily, while spreading their opinions out quickly. But after reading this article I realized that people including myself should speak up more often as other people may be struggling or needing the same help as you so you can be a helping hand for each other. Speaking up