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Armor and Flesh : poems
In these poems there is the duality of wanting and needing, softness and hardness. The vulnerability of flesh and the necessary protection of armor are in constant conflict. There is a fusion of male and female, of self and other the self outside itself, looking in a mirror, sometimes in mystery or knowing terror at what it sees. Here are the stark, dark places where self and selves unfurl, confront, and recombine. These cleanly wrought poems confirm that nothing is simple and that flesh could not long survive without the intricate armor of luck, imagination, and grace. This first collection was the 2004 winner of the Naomi Long Madgett Poetry Award.
- GenresPoetry
61 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 2004
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About the author
Mendi Lewis Obadike
3 books5 followersWhen I was white I was a man.
My hair was wavy and feathered.
I wore a cowboy hat. (It was
the Seventies. I was a stud.)
I went to bars and picked up girls.
I could have any one I saw.
They bought me drinks and I drank them
then took my favorites home to my
waterbed. I never doubted
this was me. (Even though I was
a small, black girl watching myself
over my shoulder.) I knew what
to whisper in a woman’s ear,
how to wear those bones under my skin,
and did not need to see my face
or recognize my own soft voice.
("One Black Girlhood", from Armor and Flesh)
My hair was wavy and feathered.
I wore a cowboy hat. (It was
the Seventies. I was a stud.)
I went to bars and picked up girls.
I could have any one I saw.
They bought me drinks and I drank them
then took my favorites home to my
waterbed. I never doubted
this was me. (Even though I was
a small, black girl watching myself
over my shoulder.) I knew what
to whisper in a woman’s ear,
how to wear those bones under my skin,
and did not need to see my face
or recognize my own soft voice.
("One Black Girlhood", from Armor and Flesh)
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 20, 2022
This collection is a joy to experience.
February 19, 2008
Reading 'Armor and Flesh' is like a cold shock of mountain air: your eyes smart, the wind pulls your skin taut across your face, and you ears are howling.
Speaking of 'Howl'ing, Ms. Obadike's metrical techniques reminded me of the encounter that can never happen: Alan Ginsberg and Cheryl Clarke.
Her voice has a deceptively deadpan form and this complements her profound sense of humor, particularly about things that hold a great deal of pain. This may initially make readers resist her voice, but I feel it draws the reader further into her poems.
One could describe the book in totally affectless, post-structural terms as something like "the working out of contradictory and complex black lesbian subjectivities". But that shuts down a lot of the emergent possibilities of her work. Imagine that phrase applied to, say, Audre Lorde's poetry and prose!
Ms. Obadike writes from the experiences of being black and lesbian under patriarchy, homophobia, and white supremacy, she does not speak for that position.
It would be terrific to see an issue of say, Callaloo or another literary/critical journal, with essays on her book, with some unpublished poems.
Lastly, if you don't acquire 'Armor and Flesh', I'll keep writing this review for pages and pages. We gotta deal? Great.
Speaking of 'Howl'ing, Ms. Obadike's metrical techniques reminded me of the encounter that can never happen: Alan Ginsberg and Cheryl Clarke.
Her voice has a deceptively deadpan form and this complements her profound sense of humor, particularly about things that hold a great deal of pain. This may initially make readers resist her voice, but I feel it draws the reader further into her poems.
One could describe the book in totally affectless, post-structural terms as something like "the working out of contradictory and complex black lesbian subjectivities". But that shuts down a lot of the emergent possibilities of her work. Imagine that phrase applied to, say, Audre Lorde's poetry and prose!
Ms. Obadike writes from the experiences of being black and lesbian under patriarchy, homophobia, and white supremacy, she does not speak for that position.
It would be terrific to see an issue of say, Callaloo or another literary/critical journal, with essays on her book, with some unpublished poems.
Lastly, if you don't acquire 'Armor and Flesh', I'll keep writing this review for pages and pages. We gotta deal? Great.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews