Audre Lorde -- 1934-1992
Audre Lorde often identified herself as a Black lesbian feminist warrior poet mother. A prolific author and activist, she wrote groundbreaking poems and essays on racial identity, political consciousness and connections between Afro-European, Afro-Asian, and Afro-American women whom she called "the hyphenated people." She was the daughter of Grenadian parents.
Her work carried themes of the need for love and commitment in our lives, interconnectedness, difference as a creative force, the South African struggle, the beauty and love of women, the pain and compassion of Black mothers and the encouragement of the voices of lesbians and women of color.
Lorde published nine volumes of poetry and five of prose, and contributed writings to numerous periodicals and anthologies. Her works have been translated into many languages. They include: The Black Unicorn, Sister Outsider, Zami: A New Spelling of My Name, Coal between Ourselves, The Cancer Journals, A Burst of Light and Undersong.
She taught college students, organized among women of color, and politicized audiences with her poetry readings. In 1980, she helped found Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press. She lived the last years of her life in St. Croix, Virgin Islands.
On November 17, 1992 Audre Lorde died after a long term bout with cancer.
Meet
by Audre Lorde
Woman when we met on the solstice
high over halfway between your world and mine
rimmed with full moon and no more excuses
your red hair burned my fingers as I spread you
tasting your ruff down to sweetness
and I forgot to tell you
I have heard you calling across this land
in my blood before meeting
and I greet you again
on the beaches in mines lying platforms
in trees full of tail-tail birds flicking
and deep in your caves of decomposed granite
even over my own late rite hills
after a long journey
licking your sons
while you wrinkle your nose at the stench.
Coming to rest
in open mirrors of your demanded body
I will be black light as you lie against me
I will be heavy as August over your hair
our rivers flow from the same sea
and I promise to leave you again
full of amazement and our illuminations
dealt through the short tongues of color
or the taste of each other's skin when it hung
from our childhood mouths.
When we meet again
will you put your hands upon me
will I ride you over our lands
will we sleep beneath trees in the rain?
You shall get young as I lick your stomach
hot and at rest before we move off again
you will be white fury in my navel
I will be sweeping night
Mawulisa foretells our bodies
as our hands touch and learn
from each others hurt.
Taste my milk in the ditches of Chile and
Ouagadougou
in Tema's bright port while the priestess of
Larteh protects us
in the high meat stalls of Palmyra and Abomey- Calavi
now you are my child and my mother
we have always been sisters in pain.
Come in the curve of the Lion's bulging stomach
lie for a season out of the judging rain
we have mated we have cubbed
we have high time for work and another meeting
women exchanging blood
in the innermost rooms of moment
we must taste of each other's fruit
at least once
before we shall both be slain.
Meet was first printed in Sinister Wisdom, #3, 1977 and reprinted in The Black Unicorn (1978, W.W. Norton, N.Y., U.S.A.)
