Yesterday afternoon my friend and I saw "Beautiful When She's Angry", a documentary about the seventies feminist movement. It brought tears to my eyes, to remember how it felt to be in a consciousness raising group, to march for women's rights, to read and listen to women writers, to speak out for myself and others. I first encountered the movement when I was in graduate school, and my best friend in married student housing was attending a group. She was also meditating, which I'd never seen anyone do, and building furniture, baking whole wheat bread and insisting her husband do the dishes and childcare. My mind was blown, as we used to say.
When I left my husband, I joined a consciousness raising group, volunteered at the Women's Herstory Center for Laura X, went to readings, hunted for books written by women and tried to follow "A Guide to Non-Sexist Child Rearing". I was hungry for women's voices and soon was working in a safehouse encouraging battered wives to write about their truths. I learned to speak out and up. I wept over Tillie Olson and Adrienne Rich at readings. Their truth was mine. I joined a poetry writing and publishing collective, and one time we went to the city to see Judy Chicago's "The Dinner Party". The world was opening up to us. Why? Because in safety and privacy we spoke of our lives honestly. We spoke of our mother's lives. We spoke of what we wished for our daughters. My little girl was riding a horse and taking self defense. I wanted her strong, powerful and free.
Right speech can blow open a secret world and make demands for justice. It can speak of what it feels like to be a second class citizen. It can change the world, and it did.
No comments:
Post a Comment