IMOGENE’S NOTEBOOK
Her Story of Poetry
Free verse poetry as delivered by my muse
The morning after the blue moon
My muse woke me and said:
The first known poet was a woman of colour
The first known poet is a woman of colour
Listen —
A man cancelled her
A man put a stop to her words
To her power
And she called on her god
And her god failed her
Only then did she see
That the goddess held
The power
The goddess already knew well
How to respond to a power grab.
Let women praise women…
Later, when man explained history
Expressed and charmed poetry
Described the flow of sapphic verse
And which words were not wanted
And how it should be done
Sifted words and phrases into
Piles of good and bad
Shook his head with patience
This way, not that way
All the dusty old books say
And didn’t, doesn’t even try to understand
Because poetry is secure in a cage of his making
The human condition as explained by men
Often adequately, yet it misses half the reason —
