Writers Matter In A Society To The

Increasingly I Think Of Poetry As A Theatre Of Voices, Not As Coming From A Single "i" Or From Any One Position. I Want To Imagine Voices Different From My Own.

The Women's Movement Appeared At A Very Crucial Moment In My Life. There Was A Whole Political Movement Asking Such Questions And Others I Had Never Asked. I Began To Feel Heard In That Movement. But It Was Because My Voice Was Resonating With Other Voices.

It's As If, In The Mother's Eyes, Her Smile, Her Stroking Touch, The Child First Reads The Message:'you Are There!'

If I Cling To Circumstances I Could Feel Not Responsible. Only She Who Says She Did Not Choose, Is The Loser In The End.

That's Why I Want To Speak To You Now. To Say: No Person, Trying To Take Responsibility For Her Or His Identity, Should Have To Be So Alone. There Must Be Those Among Whom We Can Sit Down And Weep, And Still Be Counted As Warriors. (i Make Up This Strange, Angry Packet For You, Threaded With Love.) I Think You Thought There Was No Such Place For You, And Perhaps There Was None Then, And Perhaps There Is None Now; But We Will Have To Make It, We Who Want An End To Suffering, Who Want To Change The Laws Of History, If We Are Not To Give Ourselves Away.