Poetry
Maya Angelou's unforgettable collection of poetry lends its name to the documentary film about her life, And Still I Rise, as seen on PBS's American Masters.
Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms,
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.
Thus begins "Phenomenal Woman," just one of the beloved poems collected here in Maya Angelou's third book of verse. These poems are powerful, distinctive, and fresh--and, as always, full of the lifting rhythms of love and remembering. And Still I Riseis written from the heart, a celebration of life as only Maya Angelou has discovered it.
"It is true poetry she is writing," M.F.K. Fisher has observed, "not just rhythm, the beat, rhymes. I find it very moving and at times beautiful. It has an innate purity about it, unquenchable dignity. . . . It is astounding, flabbergasting, to recognize it, in all the words I read every day and night . . . it gives me heart, to hear so clearly the caged bird singing and to understand her notes."
Suffrage Songs and Verses (1911) is a collection of political poems by American author and feminist Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Inspired by her work as a social reformer and advocate for women's suffrage, Gilman turned to poetry as a means of supporting the cause of suffragists everywhere. Although she is widely recognized for her novels, short stories, and nonfiction, Gilman's poetry showcases her command of language and fiery passion for the political and social advancement of women.
"She Walketh Veiled and Sleeping" opens the collection with an image of latent power, a woman "[s]low advancing, halting, creeping...to the hour" of her liberation. In "Locked Inside," Gilman echoes the trope of poetry as a voice imprisoned-explored by such poets as Ovid, Coleridge, and Dickinson-to envision a woman who "beats upon her bolted door, / With faint weak hands," barred from the life of the world she not only desires, but desperately needs. In "Boys Will Be Boys"-a poem with a message for our contemporary awakening to the violence perpetrated by men against women-Gilman argues that women must turn to "love and truth" rather than "warfare" in order to have their way. Other poems in Suffrage Songs and Verses explore the nature of motherhood, the institution of marriage, and the need to elevate individual identity beyond the confines of gender. Gilman's work as a poet proves a substantial contribution to both the suffragist cause and the vibrant tradition of political poetry in twentieth century literature.
With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's Suffrage Songs and Verses is a classic of American literature and poetry reimagined for modern readers.