New York Headshop and Museum (1970) is considered her most political and rhetorical culmination of works, writings and poems detailing her perspective as a Socialist, Black, Queer, and a Mother in New York City. She details experiences with student workers rights protests, Vietnam war protests, Critical race disparities, the homeless and drug addicted populations at the time, and general day to day life of her commute, what she sees in Grocery stores, in the streets and interactions with strangers. Her poetry very much is a real time capture of what life was in new York in the 70s.
Social justice – “ Down Wall Street. the students marched for peace. Above, construction workers looking on remembered. how it was for them in the old days. before their closed shop white security. and daddy pays the bills. so they climbed down the girders. and taught their sons a lesson. called Marx is a victim of the generation gap. called I grew up the hard way so will you. called. the limits of sentimental vision.” – The workers rose on may day or postscript to Karl Marx (Lorde 1974; 14). In this Poem, Audre Lorde is detailing the division in labor movements and blue-collar workers especially identifying an age difference. Because the older workers had experienced hardship in similar ways to the students in this context (or so is at least inferred), there is the building of a culture which is more willing to accept preventable hardships just for the purpose of “rite of passage” cultural ties. The intention is to highlight this.
Queerness – “Speak earth and bless me with what is richest. Make sky flow honey out of my hips. Rigid as mountains. Spread over valley. Carved out by the mouth of rain. And I knew when I entered her I was. High wind in her forests hollow. Fingers whispering sound. Honey flowed. From the split cup. Impaled on a lance of tongues. On the tips of her breasts on her navel. And my breath. Howling into her entrances. Through lungs of pain. Greedy as herring gulls. Or a child. I swing out over the earth. Over and over. Again. – Love poem (Lorde 1974; p. 26) In Love Poem, Audre Lorde is detailing her experience within a lesbian sexual relationship
Intersectional Feminism – “ While I sit choosing the voice. In which my children hear my prayers. Above the wind. They will follow the black roads out of my hands. Unencumbered by the weight of my remembered sorrows. By the weight of my remembered sorrows. They will use my legends to shape their own language. And make it ruler. Measuring the distance between my hungers. And their own purpose. I am afraid. They will discard my most ancient nightmares. Where fallen gods became demon. Instead of dust. – Black Studies I. (Lorde 1974; p. 53). Black Studies I, II, & III were all written from the perspective of when Audre Lorde was working there the city university of new York (CUNY) was being protested to which the university’s response was to start a Black Studies program; the perspective she shares surrounds her identity as a Black queer woman in her profession as an educator
In New York Head Shop and Museum, Audre Lorde details not just an affinity but an affection for socialist and civil right movements and especially of anti-Vietnam war efforts and racial disparities she witnesses and experiences living in New York. Her use of Marxism in its application to early theories of intersectionality and black feminist literature absolute paint the picture for a piece of the back bone for empowering literature critical of the politics against Black and brown communities and the people residing in them – very much establishing a loving relationship in just identifying people in their everyday lives, that itself contributing to the state of domestic politics then and now.
New York head shop and museum was Published in 1974, however a fair amount of the works listed in the book existed before hand throughout the early 70s, the publication of the culmination comes after the retreat of Vietnam, Nixion resigned after getting caught in the Watergate scandal, and at a height of cold war era and war on drug era politics motivating different levels of fear in a time of transition for the U.S. During this time especially for where Audre Lorde is writing about, New York Headshop is a record of the climate of New York City as Audre Lorde sees it – Categorizing in explicit detail the politics of race, space and neighborhood.
This publication covers such a wide range of topics and emotions, it can be difficult to share what some of the poems are about without spoiling the full poem piece by piece; as a result of that I really enjoyed Love Poem and Key food because of the outright expression of love towards another person in the way Audre Lorde does it. I feel Lorde has such a way to convey affection of everyday people and her romantic interests. additionally following a much darker tone Vietnam Addenda for/Clifford, Revolution is one form of social change and Separation are incredibly strong pieces and convey such a vivid image of very real struggle and difficulties associated to political issues. Audre Lorde truly has such a beautifully artistic conception of the world laid out in her poetry and left for all to examine not just in her endeavors to describe people in general but to outline deeply sociological concepts within political issues
If you’re interested in content like this book or would like, please explore the listed material below
All Men are Mortal - A Fictional story about a woman who falls in love with an immortal man
Moonlight (2016) – Is a movie about a Black man from Miami as he goes through his young adolescence into adulthood as he is raised by role models, experiences discrimination and grows more comfortable in his queerness (on HBO max)
Da 5 Bloods (2020) – Da 5 bloods is a Movie on Netflix about four Black Vietnam veterans returning back to Vietnam to recover the remains of their friend stormin’ Norman and gold the five of them had discovered in the midst of the war