Dear XMCA friends,
One of those busy weeks that all I can do is lurk. But I wanted to share
part of a poem that I wrote a long time ago -- it touches on many themes
we've been talking about, and it being the weekend, I hope a little poetry
won't go amiss. Class, and language, and race. All the best, Leigh
(ps some of the American referents might not be clear; Andover, Exeter and
Taft are exclusive college preparatory high schools from which many
students go on to Harvard University. Rhode Island is in New England, and
I've transliterated my own accent from there. "pahk the cah in havad yahd"
(Park the car in Harvard Yard) is a phrase people use to make fun of this
New England accent as it incorporates several of the hallmark sounds.)
(pps I'm happy to share the whole poem with those who would like a copy)
---I Want My Accent Back
Halloween, October 31, 1979
For C., my sister, and for Cher'rie Moraga, also my sister
i
it is cold in Rhode Island today. Here San Francisco blooms blue and gold/sunlight burns
it is the last day of the old year. tonight we share the Feast of the Dead begin the silence the move into dark toward winter light.
I have been dressed in black for days I am finally getting ready to mourn my difference from you.
ii
it turned out so dry here, c. beached on a clay that slips with my own wetness i deluded in the movement i moved away and away and away. queer how the beach kept receding queer how there was never a way to hold on to the changes all around me and never a name that would make sense queer
iii
my first class way of being had no accidents. it never fit me before, so now that I know how to say working class it don't fit no better. and the word "token," light a light bulb peeling apart from its center strips lonely white glare from lonely white glare until only a thin tung sten wire remains.
I can't lie to you. we laughed together too many times; plotted escape too trustingly took too many baths in the same used water. Seventeen years we shared a room though I never saw you naked.
there is no escape. I am wired to you like sound putting on airs is impossible
iv
Radcliffe College, Class of 1976, magna cum laude. Stanford University, graduate studies. currently pursuing PhD at California. Publications.
I never knew we had an accent. My first week of college, sitting on the floor with Andover and Exeter and Taft, stoned, I said, "nawh wida than a bon doah." Andover turns to me, be mused: "What is a 'bon doah'? A musical instrument...? I laught nervously...causually-- "you know, the doah of a bon." Andover laughs: a barn door. A good natured hearty chuckle the others join in pahk the cah in havad yahd the conversation turns
by 9:00 the next morning my accent disappeared. except when I talk too fast, or to you my soft r's my dull t's my idears are invisible I clip my speech
and when I have tried to imitate a New England accent my tongue stumbles: it comes out Southern or British. I have sat in my room nights trying to get it back face burning girl
help me goddamn it help me get it right talk to me. talk to me. talk to me.
v
get your nose out of that book. get some fresh air. what happens in those books is not the reality. Just because you read about it doesn't mean it's so. Your father and I have been around longer than you have, don't be so smart.
my nose is stuck in this book It seems to be some kind of epoxy. I tug and tug there's blood on the pages I can't read the writing anymore my whole face is flattened into white paper
print on me.
viii
there is reach in this place we will talk we will talk there is danger in this place. dear cher'rie you write of your own life, a brown girl gone white gone brown, brown: "The danger lies in ranking the oppressions. The danger lies in failing to acknowledge the specificity of the oppression." *
for years I have lived with the inexactness of oppression among labels simple analyses but I never knew I had an accent. I want to say this so clearly: it was annihilation I feared. There is nothing in the words working class that tastes of this confusion this clear Rhode Island winter light this sister now hold me touch me I'm done with talking hold me
nothing in the words to break this clear
from Susan Leigh Star, Zone of the Free Radicals, Berkeley: Running Deer Press.
*from "La Guera," Cher'rie Moraga
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