Sappho, the mother of lesbian poetry, is undoubtedly one of the most famous lesbian poets. Despite living around 2,600 years ago in ancient Greece, her unapologetically and greatly acclaimed WLW love songs still affect and connect people to k=lesbian poetry today. After all lesbians owe their label to her, the word being a demonym for the Greek island of Lesbos, where Sappho lived.
In If not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho, we get tantalising insights into sapphic longing, a visceral and all too relatable experience:
“Frankly I wish I were dead
When she left, she wept
a great deal; she said to me, “This parting must be endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly.”
So, we know about Sappho, but who else has written titillating lesbian poetry and why is it considered ferocious?
Sapphic poetry resists our heteronormative society simply by existing. As Audre Lorde describes in her poem A Litany for Survival, lesbians are often part of those “Who love in doorways coming and going/in the hours between dawns.” One can then argue that, because societal norms often constrain sapphic intimacy and liberation, they are, out of necessity, ferocious. Cheryl Clarke expresses in her poem nothing the desire to “kiss her in public places” – a simple kiss becomes a political act, a defiance to a heteronormative society.
However, could we just appreciate the beauty of desire and love between two women that lesbian poetry celebrates rather than view it as a ferocious political act? I would say yes, it is possible to appreciate lesbian poetry for its description of romantic desire, but lesbian poets are not lesbians in isolation of race, social class, gender or religion. All these identities are intersectional. Especially, within the lesbian community, the identities of Butches and Studs are respectively tied to historical and racial identity.
When discussing intersectionality in relation to lesbian poetry it is impossible not to discuss Audre Lorde. Lorde described herself as “Black, Lesbian, Mother, Warrior, Poet,” refusing to let a singular label define her. As she told interviewer Charles H. Rowell: “My sexuality is part and parcel of who I am, and my poetry comes from the intersection of me and my worlds.”
I have included some recommendations and hope that, even by only scratching the surface of this topic, more lesbian poetry will take residence on your bookshelves.
Some Recommendations:
· For the Courtesan Ch’ing Lin by Wu Tsao.
· The Black Unicorn: Poems by Audre Lorde
· LOVE CAKE Poems by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
· Living as a Lesbian: Poetry by Cheryl Clarke
· My lover is a woman by Pat Parker
· Absence By Amy Lowell
· The Highest Apple: Sappho and the Lesbian Poetic Tradition by Judy Grahn
Illustration Via Mio Shinohara For The Student