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I am an instrument in the shape/ of a woman trying to translate pulsations/ into images for the relief of the body/ and the reconstruction of the mind.

Adrienne Rich

In [family snapshots] the flow of profane time has been stopped and a sacred interval of self-conscious revelation has been cut from it by the edge of the picture frame and the light of the sun or the flash.
ADRIENNE RICH

Conscious Cutting Interval Light Profane Revelation Self Stopped Time
The repossession by women of our bodies will bring far more essential change to human society than the seizing of the means of production by workers.
ADRIENNE RICH

Aquariums Bodies Bring Essential Human Mean More Repossession Seizing Society Women
If you think you can grasp me, think again: my story flows in more than one direction, a delta springing from the river bed with its five fingers spread.
ADRIENNE RICH

Again Delta Direction Flow Grasp One River Springing Story Thinking
Probably there is nothing in human nature more resonant with charges than the flow of energy between two biologically alike bodies, one of which has lain in amniotic bliss inside the other, one of which has labored to give birth to the other.
ADRIENNE RICH

Alike Biological Bodies Charges Energy Giving Human Nature Nothing Probably Resonant Two
The password is a flicker of an eyelash.
ADRIENNE RICH

Eyelash Eyelashes Flicker Password
In a history of spiritual rupture, a social compact built on fantasy and collective secrets, poetry becomes more necessary than ever: it keeps the underground aquifers flowing; it is the liquid voice that can wear through stone.
ADRIENNE RICH

Aquifer Collective History Rupture Secret Spiritual Voice
I think about the possibilities for empathy, for mutual solidarity among gay men and lesbians, not simply as people who suffer under homophobia, but as people who are also extremely creative, active, and have a particular understanding of the human condition.
ADRIENNE RICH

Gay Lesbian Men People Possibilities Solidarity Suffer Thinking
I wanted him [my father] to cherish and approve of me, not as he had when I was a child, but as the woman I was, who had her own mind and had made her own choices.
ADRIENNE RICH

Approve Cherish Children Choice Father Made Mind Wanted
It is important to possess a short-term pessimism and a long-term optimism.
ADRIENNE RICH

Important Long Optimism Pessimism Possess Term
Show us to ourselves when we are outlawed or made invisible, remind us of beauty where no beauty seems possible, remind us of kinship where all is represented as separation.
ADRIENNE RICH

Beauty Invisible Made Outlawed Possible Remind Represented Seem Separation Show
When my dreams showed signs of becoming politically correct no unruly images escaping beyond borders … then I began to wonder
ADRIENNE RICH

Becoming Border Correct Dream Escaping Political Politically Showed Sign
A revolutionary poem will not tell you who or when to kill, what and when to burn, or even how to theorize. It reminds you… where and when and how you are living and might live, it is a wick of desire.
ADRIENNE RICH

Burn Desire Kill Living might Poem Remind Revolutionary Theorize Wick
It is part of our refusal of the self-destructiveness of male-dominated society.
ADRIENNE RICH

Destructiveness Dominated Male Refusal Self Society
Spaces within a line, double colons, slashes, are indications of pause, of breath, of urgency, they are not metrically exact as in a musical notation but they serve (I hope) to make the reader think about the sound of the poem.
ADRIENNE RICH

Breath Colon Double Indication Metrically Musical Notation Pause Slash Sound Space Urgency
Experience is always larger than language.
ADRIENNE RICH

Always Experience Language Larger
In order to live a fully human life we require not only control of our bodies (though control is a prerequisite); we must touch the unity and resonance of our physicality, our bond with the natural order, the corporeal grounds of our intelligence.
ADRIENNE RICH

Bodies Body Control Fully Human Intelligence Life Natural Order Physical Unity

I am an instrument in the shape/ of a woman trying to translate pulsations/ into images for the relief of the body/ and the reconstruction of the mind.

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I am an instrument in the shape/ of a woman trying to translate pulsations/ into images for the relief of the body/ and the reconstruction of the mind.

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