My latest piece

went out in Pambazuka News today: a review of African Voices in Imagining Ourselves

I got a craving today

for words that weren't newspeak, journalism, grant fodder, the litany of global injustice. Which is to say I haven't read any poems for a while. I don't notice the absence, the way you don't notice a nutritional deficiency in your diet when you're busy, until you start gnawing hunks of cheese, or downing M & M s like water.

So there I was at my local library, scanning and yanking in the poetry section, like any junkie on a binge. Sharon Olds, Billy Collins, Mary Oliver, Ana Castillo, Philip Levine. I devoured The Gold Cell, by Sharon Olds, in one voracious 40-minute gulp over a cappuccino. Felt the driven, insatiable itchiness ebb out of my bones with each rock-salt poem.

I laughed aloud in the cafe at The Pope's Penis:

It hangs deep in his robes, a delicate
clapper at the center of a bell.
It moves when he moves, a ghostly fish in a
halo of silver seaweed, the hair
swaying in the dark and the heat - and at night,
while his eyes sleep, it stands up
in praise of God.

Sucked on words like glaucous and integuments.

Took a sharp breath at the poignant sweetness of the final lines of the final poem (about her children):

...When love comes to me and says
What do you know, I say This girl, this boy.

from Looking at Them Asleep

false accusations

Jacob Zuma, South Africa's former deputy president, has just been acuquitted of rape.

The judge said that his accuser, a 31-year-old woman, had a history of making false accusations of rape.

Yeah, that's what women do. Particularly young, vulnerable, HIV+ women in South Africa, where a woman gets raped every 26 seconds, and the conviction rate for rapists is below 7%.

Perhaps she was bored. Or it was that time of the month - we all know how a woman's hormones go haywire every 28 days. She didn't have enough going on in her life. So she thought:

I know - I'll bring charges of rape against one of the most powerful men in the country!

A man double my age, whom I revered as a child, grew up calling "Uncle".

The prospect of crowds of his supporters, chanting for my blood, sending death threats, yelling "Burn the bitch" outside the courthouse, just thrills me!

I can't wait to be grilled on my whole life and sexual history in an open witness stand. Thank God South African law doesn't allow rape victims to testify in camera!

I go all warm and fuzzy when I think of the legal system I'm about to dive into - run by, and filled with, men who are "Uncle's" peers and cronies. I know they'll make the whole experience extra-special for me.

I'm so looking forward to going into hiding for the next few months. To hearing how I obviously begged to be raped because I wore a kanga in his home. Because I "didn't sit properly, with her legs closed" while I had a skirt on.

Oooh, I'm getting excited just thinking about it! How soon can I get down to the police station to file the complaint?


Go to One In Nine to support the campaign against sexual violence in South Africa.

Imagine a woman

who believes it is right and good she is a woman. A woman who honors her experience and tells her stories. Who refuses to carry the sins of others within her body and life.

Imagine a woman who believes she is good. A woman who trusts and respects herself. Who listens to her needs and desires, and meets them with tenderness and grace.

Imagine a woman who has acknowledged the past's influence on the present. A woman who has walked through her past. Who has healed into the present

Imagine a woman who authors her own life. A woman who exerts, initiates, and moves on her own behalf. Who refuses to surrender except to her truest self and to her wisest voice.

Imagine a woman who names her own gods. A woman who imagines the divine in her image and likeness. Who designs her own spirituality and allows it to inform her daily life.

Imagine a woman in love with her own body. A woman who believes her body is enough, just as it is. Who celebrates her body and its rhythms and cycles as an exquisite resource.

Imagine a woman who honors the face of the Goddess in her changing face. A woman who celebrates the accumulation of her years and her wisdom. Who refuses to use precious energy disguising the changes in her body and life.

Imagine a woman who values the women in her life. A woman who sits in circles of women. Who is reminded of the truth about herself when she forgets. Imagine yourself as this woman.

Excerpted from :
Imagine a Woman In Love with Herself

by Patricia Lynn Reilly

Imagining Ourselves

is the global, online, currently live exhibition / multimedia extravaganza of the International Museum of Women.

This month's theme is Culture and Conflict, and features my work as part of the global conversation. Check it out, and post a comment!