Belly Dancer By Diane Wakoski

In reading Diane Wakoski's " Belly Dancer," I get the feeling that this poem is about a woman's liberation. The speaker or the belly dancer is speaking about how the belly dancer moves her body so freely and how the fabrics on her body make her body feel good.The speaker also talks about the uptight women who watch this free spirit of a belly dancer mover her body to the awakening rhythms. The uptight women are women who repress their desires and their wants. They are modern and contemporary in the ways they dress but their minds are stuck in an old school mentality. These women feel they should act a certain way because society has told them to do so, so they repress their feelings, their desires and their wants to adhere to a "man's world." The uptight women frown, or look away, or laugh stiffly. They are afraid of these materials and these moves, they are afraid it may awaken a deep desire they've repressed for so long that even their husbands couldn't satisfy. The dancer is really scorning the men not doing it for their satisfaction. The belly dancer wants to awaken these women and make them feel more liberated in their ways and be freer to do as they feel. Overall i really liked this poem and I feel that in todays society, there are still women like this. Today is a more liberal time to live in but there are still pressures on women to act a certain way and to adhere to certain goals by certain ages such as, finding a perfect man, getting married, having kids, and so on and so forth.. Where in today's day, nto every woman would agree with that standard of life. There are a lot of women who are single mothers, never got married, or women who are lesbians, or women who chose to live different lifestyles. I think everyone should be able to live they way they want without the pressures of society to be or act or even look a certain way. I think women should continue to be more liberal in their ways of life and shouldn't be afraid to be who they truly are.

Personal Letter No.3 By Sonia Sanchez

nothing will keep
us young you know
not young men or
women who spin
their youth on
cool playing sounds.
we are what we
are what we never
think we are.
no more wild geo
graphies of the
flesh. echoes. that
we move in tune
to slower smells.
it is a hard thing
to admit that
sometimes after midnight
i am tired
of it all.

In Sonia Sanchez's poem, " Personal Letter No.3," I feel like this is a person reflecting on their life. The speaker is saying that nothing will keep you young not other young men or young women," who spin their youth on cool playing sounds."
The speaker goes onto say " we are what we are, what we never think we are." This sentence translates to me as we are who we are, including the things we try to hide from or are in denial about.. so following the first line, I feel like the poem is talking about the undeniable transition of aging. How people try so hard to stay looking young and keep from looking old.. A lot of people don't want to keep aging, so they go to extremes to keep themselves looking young or feeling young. This kind of reminds me of Peter Pan in a way because he was the boy who never wanted to grow up.. Some people have complexes and mostly on aging.. which is why so many people get into face lifts and botox for their faces .. to beat the signs of aging.. but no matter how much you do to cover it up you will still eventually age and the true appearance seeps through. I feel like Sanchez is fed up with people who can't embrace aging in a graceful manner and who can't be true to themselves. Sanchez wants people to be grateful for what they have and to be more mindful of how aging is a natural process of life. People should be happy with who they are organically and just embrace it. I feel like because the poem is titled "Personal Letter No.3," it is most likely a personal idea that she had in her head and wrote it down. It was a reflection perhaps because it was personal.. I think this poem was an overall strong message to just love yourself and stop trying to be something you are not or cant be for forever. Sanchez concludes the poem with her being tired of it all, after midnight.. which makes you think of being young.. how when your young you are out all hours of the night enjoying life and doing whatever. The older you get though, it seems as though the earlier your home and don't want to be out at all hours of the night.. like when your life is more settled.Overall I really enjoyed this poem.

There It Is By Jayne Cortez

Jayne Cortez's " There It Is," is a poem with a straightforward message. It cuts straight to the chase with no extra philosophical ideas. It's simple and direct. Cortez basically says If you don't do this, then you'll end up this way.. for example Cortez says:
"And if we don't fight
if we don't resist
if we don't organize and unify and
get the power to control our own lives."
Cortez is basically reiterating her point that if something isn't done the way it should be done, then it'll end up a different way, and sometimes the end result might not be what you wanted..Cortez is talking about standing up and being strong for the choices you chose to follow and live by. Cortez is saying to be in control of your life and not to just sit back and let life happen to you. Only you are the one to make the choices that outline or direct where your life is going. you are in charge of your destiny. Cortez then says if you don't do these things:
"Then we will wear
the exaggerated look of captivity
the stylized look of submission
the bizarre look of suicide
the dehumanized look of fear
and the decomposed look of repression
forever and ever and ever
And there it is "
I love the choice of words Cortez used to make that point. If you don't in fact make the choices of your life or stand for what you believe in, you will wear the looks of captivity, submission, suicide, fear, and repression for ever and ever." It makes the message even stronger. You can think of all of these looks but the way it is verbalized makes it so clear in your mind and is something everyone can relate to. If these people don't fight, then they will wear these looks for the rest of their lives.
I find it interesting that Cortez uses the word " wear," in describing the looks on ones face if they don't take charge of their lives. She uses the word " wear," as if she were speaking about wearing an article of clothing. Almost as if the looks are items of clothing making them "wearable." And There It is.. the result or the solution if you don;t do things the way you should get them done.

Theme for English B by Langston Hughes

The instructor said,

Go home and write
a page tonight.
And let that page come out of you—
Then, it will be true.
"Theme for English B," by Langston Hughes is a poem that his professor gave him an advice to help him to write. Hughes professor basically tells him to write a page and to let that page come out of him. In the first stanza Hughes wonders if it's that simple?writing poetry. As he writes from what is within himself, he free writes a poem about who he is and about how Harlem is him. Harlem, what he sees and hears is him.
It’s not easy to know what is true for you or me
at twenty-two, my age. But I guess I’m what
I feel and see and hear, Harlem, I hear you.
hear you, hear me—we two—you, me, talk on this page.
(I hear New York, too.) Me—who?
Hughes goes on to say he likes to eat,sleep, drink and be in love,and that he likes to work,read,learn and understand life. He goes on to say he'd like a pipe for Christmas or records, Bessie, Bop,or Bach. He goes on to say how he guesses him being colored doesn't make him not like things that other folks like who are different races. Here he comes to the realization that even though there is a color barrier between black and white folks, he may still like some of the things other people like just the same too. He names music artists. Music is universal, it's something everyone understands and gets no matter what color skin you have.He goes on to say that what he writes wont be white but it will be apart of his professor who is obviously white accounting for a line in the poem earlier where he stated he is the only colored person in his class.Hughes says
"Being me, it will not be white.
But it will be
a part of you, instructor.
You are white—
yet a part of me, as I am a part of you.
That’s American."

This poem will be apart of the instructor who is in part a part of him and vice versa. Hughes shows us here that they are two separate people, yet they are one. They have a commonality that they are both people, they are both American. He continues to say even though the instructor may not want to be apart of him and sometimes he may not want to be apart of the professor just the same, they are apart of each other. They are both American and they both learn in turn from each other even though his white instructor is older, white and freer than he is.He ends the poem with this is his page for English B. In this time the poem was written it was true that even though he had his freedom, he still was "less" free than a white man was.There was still a lot of segregation and hard times for black people still.

Barbie Doll by Marge Piercy

In Marge Piercy's , "Barbie Doll," we see all to well about how society pushes its agenda on how women should aspire to look and behave. In our patriarchal society, girls have been taught that to be women, they are to be weak,vulnerable,soft spoken, kind, nurturing,emotional,and dainty like. Girls are also taught they have to look a certain way or measure up to a " barbie doll," image to be considered "sexy". In the poem," Barbie Doll," in the following lines:

"She was advised to play coy,
exhorted to come on hearty,
exercise, diet, smile and wheedle."

we see how it ties into what I was saying above about society has it's moldings on what a women should be. The poem shows that from childhood, girls have dolls that go "pee pee," that come along with little stoves and irons, that also come with little lipsticks of cherry red. For years women were thought only good enough to do house work and nurture children. A woman was only to be in the private sphere of the home and not in the public sphere of the workplace. Women were to keep a certain image. They were taught to wait hand and foot on their husbands, to never argue,to always smile and just be pleasant and dainty at all times.The media does a lot to push these " barbie doll," images of what women should act and look like. Magazines, music, television and ads all bombard us with images that are overtly sexual, explicit and is their ideal look of "perfection".These influences shape young womens cultural views about what they should look and behave like. It pressures young innocent minds to conform to what society says is the "right attitude" to have when trying to be the "ideal woman," or in this case, a "barbie doll." The pressures that society pushes then sets up young girls for low self esteem sometimes resulting in eating disorders or depression for trying to measure up to something that is pretty much impossible.

"She was healthy, tested intelligent,
possessed strong arms and back,
abundant sexual drive and manual dexterity.
She went to and fro apologizing.
Everyone saw a fat nose on thick legs."

In these lines Piercy is showing us that in this society most times a woman being intelligent,healthy is overlooked as something that isn't important unless she's attractive too. Looks are deemed to be more important than being intelligent or having a good sense of character. the next few lines also show this:
"Her good nature wore out
like a fan belt.
So she cut off her nose and her legs
and offered them up."
Often some women will go to the extremes to live up to society's ideal of "perfection," even harming themselves or letting go of their good nature to be something they aren't. Just as women will do it, young girls will do what it takes to " fit in," to be accepted by their peers. Unfortunately, young children aren't mature enough to handle peer pressures and teasing done by others, resulting in harming themselves physically or even trying to kill themselves.

HAY FOR THE HORSES by Gary Snyder

In the poem, "Hay For The Horses," by Gary Snyder, we are introduced to the speaker. The speaker is with another person who is a farmer. Both people are coming back from a long night of driving to go get hay for the farm. Once they get back to the farm at 8 am, the poem starts to describe the environment on the farm.Before 8 am you already get the sense of hard work put in overnight to go get this hay for the farm and before midday you also see more of the hard work that is put in on the farm in the lines that say,"With winch and ropes and hooks We stacked the bales up clean To splintery redwood rafters High in the dark, flecks of alfalfa Whirling through shingle-cracks of light, Itch of haydust in the sweaty shirt and shoes."

By lunchtime, the audience is seeing the horses eating from their pale buckets and are made aware of the crickets crackling through the weeds. We get a sense of the small, day to day things that happen on the farm.

"I'm sixty-eight" he said, "I first bucked hay when I was seventeen. I thought, that day I started, I sure would hate to do this all my life. And dammit, that's just what I've gone and done."
I feel like the poet goes from the simple day to day things to hearing the farmer say that he's sixty eight and never thought he'd be doing the same line of work that he hated so much since he was seventeen. I feel like form the beginning of the poem, the poet makes you aware of the sense of time and how it goes by so quickly. One minute you're seventeen hating this job and the next thing you know, through all the hard work and sweat put in, minute to minute, day to day, you spent your whole life working hard doing something you've hated and you're already sixty eight. That's Fifty one years spent working a job you've hated your whole life, more than a quarter or more than half of your life. It's kind of like the farmer has an epiphany in a way at the end when he says,
"I first bucked hay when I was seventeen. I thought, that day I started, I sure would hate to do this all my life. And dammit, that's just what I've gone and done."
Having this moment of clarity,like yes I did hate this all my life, it's like he gets mad at himself for doing it but then just as quickly as he gets mad, he just embraces it and takes it for what it is. It doesn't seem like this is a good thing and it doesn't seem like this is a bad thing. The farmer just embraces the hard work he has done day to day, until this point.

I guess a lot of people can relate to this poem, in the sense that a lot of people don't want to get stuck working the rest of their lives doing something they hate. Lots of people give up on their dreams, to become grownups with responsibilities who work 9-5 jobs that they dread just to fit into society. In college, there is always pressure to figure out what you want to do with the rest of your life or what career you will end up studying for. Being young,many people are confused about what they should study for their career paths because of lack of experience. This poem also reminds me of something my father always told me which is when you pick out what you want to do for the rest of your life , to make sure it's something you love because you will never work a day in your life. You will never strain yourself emotionally or physically because it's something that will make you happy to do and bring that great energy into your life and allow you to keep exerting it. Many young people with the confusion of not knowing what to do end up picking the wrong things and end up going into careers they end up hating and get stuck doing them for sometimes the rest of their lives.

"Jazz Chick " By Bob Kaufman

In the Bob Kaufman’s, “Jazz Chick,” we are introduced to the poet whom is intrigued by a woman’s “ jazzy,“ presence. Kaufman’s poem is very sensual. His use of language is very rich and alive. The poem has it’s own cool, sweet jazzy rhythm to it as you read it. Kaufman is captivated by this woman’s essence .

For example, Kaufman uses many descriptive words to paint the imagery in our minds. “Music from her breast, vibrating ,Sound seared into burnished velvet. Silent hips deceiving fools,” is how the poem starts out. Automatically you get the image of a woman with a presence so strong that emanates through everyone in the room. As the reader, I also get the image of a woman so beautiful that not one person can miss how beautiful she is. From the line about her silent hips deceiving fools, I get that from her body structure the men are turned into fools. They probably can’t help but stare at such beauty and don’t know how to behave themselves.

“Rivulets of trickling ecstasy ,From the alabaster pools of Jazz ,Where music cools
hot souls. Eyes more articulately silent, Than Medusa's thousand tongues.” From these lines I get the image of beautiful soulful jazz music fills the nightclub where everyone is and the music cools down the hormones that are raging throughout the club. Eyes throughout the nightclub are “articulately silent, than medusas thousand tongues.” Here I feel Kaufman is saying that all the eyes in the nightclub are finding the ways to flirt or talk seductively without using words. The comparison to Medusa’s thousand tongues means that the eyes in their “silence,” are louder than any verbalizing could try to accomplish. “A bridge of eyes, consenting smiles reveal her presence singing Of cool remembrance, happy balls Wrapped in swinging Jazz Her music...Jazz.” I feel here the speaker is saying a connection of eyes and approving stares, like men liking what they see in this woman he speaks about reminds them of something comfortable or common, something sweet or close to home. The woman which he speaks about has a jubilant, wholesome, happy spirit and he describes her spirit or her essence as her music, ”Jazz.” therefore being the “ Jazz Chick.”