Unlearning To Not Speak

Unlearning to Not Speak

By Marge Piercy

Blizzards of paper

in slow motion

sift through her.

In nightmares she suddenly recalls

a class she signed up for

but forgot to attend.

Now it is too late.

Now it is time for finals:

losers will be shot.

Phrases of men who lectured her

drift and rustle in piles:

Why don’t you speak up?

Why are you shouting?

You have the wrong answer,

wrong line, wrong face.

They tell her she is womb-man,

babymachine, mirror image, toy,

earth mother and penis-poor,

a dish of synthetic strawberry icecream

She grunts to a halt.

She must learn again to speak

starting with I

starting with We

starting as the infant does

with her own true hunger

and pleasure

and rage.

I caught the last seven lines of this poem last week whilst listening to a podcast and I had to track it down. Over the years in many books that I read Marge Piercy’s name pops up time and time again. Her poems always seem to touch a nerve, to put into words the unspeakable.  I have an article – Scandal in the family of hers, which is years old that I photocopied from, I think it was one of her books entitled, So You Want To Write. In it she writes about her experience of writing about difficult subject matters in her family history and the impact it had.

It’s a great article because it leaves you recognizing that no matter what the truth needs to be told and that there will always be a cost of writing your version of that story to you and to others.

Years ago when I wrote my first book Soul Purpose, I played safe, didn’t fully enter into my own story and that kept me blocked and stifled for many years as a writer.

Writing sometimes requires enormous amounts of courage.

It requires bravery.

It needs you to inhabit your dis-comfort zone.

But how often do we avoid these spaces. Playing safe with our stories, our words and kidding ourselves that it no longer matters.

I really like what Marge suggests in her poem, ‘starting with I…..’

Here’s a writing activity to try out this weekend

Just write the word I on the left hand column of a blank page and then write down whatever comes to you next?

Write the word I again and see what comes and write it down?

Write the word I again and again and again repeating the exercises seven times.

When your pen pierces the page or stabs at the keyboard what is underneath the word I?