herstory – Page 3 – Feminism and Religion

May Sarton: Leaping the Waterfalls (1912-1995 American Woman Writer), part 2 by Marie Dintino

Part 1 was posted yesterday.

That richness of self may be what May chased her entire life: for herself to be enough. Eight years later in Journal of a Solitude, May further explores her relationship with solitude:

May’s house in Nelson, NH

“Later on in the night I reached quite a different level of being. I was thinking about solitude, its supreme value. Here in Nelson I have been close to suicide more than once, and more than once have been close to a mystical experience of unity with the universe. The two states resemble each other: one has no wall, one is absolutely naked and diminished to essence. Then death would be the rejection of life because we cannot let go what we wish so hard to keep, but have to let go if we are to continue to grow”(57).

But May knew the drill, and wrote such to a friend, “I came to see that my loneliness (acute and awful) was really a loneliness for myself”(Peters 279).

In Journal of a Solitude, May reveals the challenges surrounding the writing of Mrs. Stevens in 1965, the guts it took, the mission she had in mind:

“On the surface my work has not looked radical, but perhaps it will be seen eventually that in a “nice, quiet, noisy way” I have been trying to say radical things gently so that they may penetrate without shock. The fear of homosexuality is so great that it took courage to write Mrs. Stevens, to write a novel about a woman homosexual who is not a sex maniac, a drunkard, a drug-taker, or in any way repulsive; to portray a homosexual who is neither pitiable nor disgusting, without sentimentality; and to face the truth that such a life is rarely happy, a life where art must become the primary motivation, for love is never going to fulfill in the usual sense.

“But I am well aware that I probably could not have “leveled” as I did in that book had I had any family (my parents were dead when I wrote it), and perhaps not if I had had a regular job. I have a great responsibility because I can afford to be honest. The danger is that if you are placed in a sexual context people will read your work from a distorting angle of vision. I did not write Mrs. Stevens until I had written several novels concerned with marriage and family life”(91).

The need to mask in life and art, the patience to slowly roll out the truth, in a “nice, quiet, noisy way.”

Margot Peters weighs in on Mrs. Stevens in May’s biography:

“While Hilary Stevens might outrage those who believe that women artists are not deviants, her claim that women must find their own language and subjects in the dominant world of men’s literature was a radical concept in 1965. Mrs. Stevens’s idea of “woman’s work” also goes far to explain the puzzle of May Sarton’s own oeuvre: how such an aggressive, volatile, and violent person could produce novels and poems that ultimately transcend conflict. Like Hilary Stevens, May believed that her creative demon was masculine, her sensibility feminine”(254).

”Mrs. Stevens Hears the Mermaids Singing was a novel before its time. In coming years, as the gathering momentum of the feminist, gay, and civil rights movements raised America’s consciousness and women’s studies departments sprang up on campuses across the nation, Mrs. Stevens brought its author a fame she had sought all her life”(259).

While living in Nelson, May received letter upon letter from women envying her seemingly ideal situation, but May wanted to set the record straight, that her living alone in a small rural town in New Hampshire was not the panacea so many imagined.

“No partner in a love relationship (whether homosexual or heterosexual) should feel that he has to give up an essential part of himself to make it viable. But the fact is that men still do rather consistently undervalue or devalue women’s powers as serious contributors to civilization except as homemakers. And women, no doubt, equally devalue their own powers. But there is something wrong when solitude such as mine can be “envied” by a happily married woman with children.

“Mine is not, I feel sure, the best human solution. Nor have I ever thought it was. In my case it has perhaps made possible the creation of some works of art, but certainly it has done so at a high price in emotional maturity and in happiness. What I have is space around me and time around me. How they can be achieved in marriage is the real question. It is not an easy one to answer”(Journal 123).

Make no mistake, although May was living alone, she was not alone. She had frequent visitors and was often off lecturing, leading workshops and teaching seminars. Nelson was an attempt to extract, one met with mixed results.

May Sarton grappled with life’s intangibles while living as close as possible to tangible pleasures; she struggled with darkness in the greatest sense and basked in full-on light in the intimate moments, where she found peace. Nothing was meaningless; everything was meaningless. She bared her soul and her heart, revealed her gifts and vulnerabilities in a way not many dare.

“Rage is the deprived infant in me but there is also a compassionate mother in me and she will come back with her healing powers in time”(Peters 339). How accurately May’s sums herself up here; for all her crossness and fire, she was generous to a fault, gifting thousands of dollars to friends every single year.

May became a gardener, as was her mother. In Nelson, she planted, weeded, harvested and displayed vibrant, oh-so-necessary flowers. It became a true labor of love, for even if she wasn’t up to doing such work, she forced herself out of doors to commune with the rocky soil, the scent of dirt and plants, the distinct hope of growth and blossoms. This seemed the antidote to starving for love and light:

“For a long time, for years, I have carried in my mind the excruciating image of plants, bulbs, in a cellar, trying to grow without light, putting out white shoots that will inevitably wither. It is time I examined this image. Until now it has simply made me wince and turn away, bury it, as really too terrible to contemplate.”(Journal 57).

May lamented in a letter to a friend,

“My rage and woe come from great and prolonged suffering that the critics have never never given the poems a break. I see the mediocre winning and I suppose to keep going I have to get mad…better than committing suicide. It is a fight to survive somehow against the current. I am a salmon leaping the waterfalls”(Peters 279).

Thank you for passionately and patiently swimming against the current, May.

May Sarton is a #NastyWomanWriter.

(Here’s the post about May’s resting place in the Nelson cemetery: The Phoenix Takes Its Rest: Visiting May Sarton’s Grave.)

©Maria Dintino 2019

Works Cited:

Peters, Margot. May Sarton: a Biography. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997.

Sarton, May. Journal of a Solitude. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1973.

Sarton, May. Mrs. Stevens Hears the Mermaids Singing. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1965.

May Sarton: Leaping the Waterfalls (1912-1995 American Woman Writer), part 1 by Marie Dintino

Moderator’s Note: This piece is in co-operation with The Nasty Women Writers Project, a site dedicated to highlighting and amplifying the voices and visions of powerful women. The site was founded by sisters Theresa and Maria Dintino. To quote Theresa, “by doing this work we are expanding our own writer’s web for nourishment and support.” This was originally posted on their site on July 13, 2021. You can see more of their posts here.

Spending summer 2021 in New Hampshire, I drive through Nelson quite often these days. Each time I do, I think of May Sarton, her years here, who she was, her art, and all she accomplished. I always glance down the road at the cemetery where she now rests.*

This post is one I wrote about May two years ago and it feels right to run it again since I feel so close to her these days. Enjoy!

May Sarton: Leaping the Waterfalls

I’d been duped. The gray-haired writer who moved to the small town of Nelson, New Hampshire in 1958 was not who I imagined. I only discovered this when I began work on this post. Far from the tranquil woman in my mind, May Sarton was an enigma, even to herself.

At forty-six, May Sarton purchased her first and only house, attempting to extract herself. In a destructive relationship, struggling to reign herself in, she sought to settle, to live where only those she wanted to see or those who really wanted to see her would visit. Plus, the dramatic move would provide fresh writing material.

May, high school graduation, Cambridge, MA 1929

Circle of Fire by Sara Wright

Moderator’s Note: This is the final part of Sara’s poem that was posted last week. You can read it here.

Part 1

She burned
in raging fires
swamped by
merciless floods
crossed mountains
of grief
so wide so deep
crushed Silence
in her sleep
unknowingly
accompanied
by Owls
and Winter Wren
Marked by Bear’s
sharp Protective
Claws
Circles of Fire

Two Poems: Crucifixion and Renewal by Sara Wright

(The Mark of the Bear is Upon Her)

CRUCIFIXION

Part I

She listens
to those
who intone
Betrayal
break hearts
open

love
pours golden
honey
healing
blood
soaked
wounds

truth
often
lies hidden
deep
beneath
kindly words

torment
tears holes
in fragile
skin

without
closure

Herstory Profiles: Bletchley Park, the 6888th, and Communication by Anjeanette LeBoeuf

There is so much going on in our current state of affairs, that I found myself reaching for some sort of touchstone, centering agent, even some sort of calming force. As a scholar, as someone drawn to the humanities, I knew the path forward had to include our histories. This post will look at three examples of extraordinary women during WWII and beyond: the 6888^th Unit, the women of Bletchley Park, and Julie Moore.

All three were introduced to me through popular culture, storytelling, and our dedication to preserving whole histories. At a time where we are seeing an active attack on our histories, humanities, arts, and our education systems it is even more vital that we continue to tell the stories, remember their names, and continue to walk the paths they have forged.

SheSpeaks! Eve by Janet Maika’i Rudolph

Author’s Note: I have begun a project called She Speaks! Women of the Bible Have Their Say. As part of this project, I have done five films with some very dedicated actors (friends of mine) who have dubbed themselves the SheSpeaks!Ensemble. I showed 4 of the films at the recent Yerusha Symposium. Based on the comments and reception, the project is now expanding. I am looking to create longer films that include story arcs. The first one will be of Eve. Below is the script for Eve along with the link to the video.

EVE speaks:

Why hello I don’t get visitors very often! Welcome. Come, come sit under my tree, let’s share some tea. I have the most wonderful and flavorful herbs here in my garden.

Look around at my most marvelous paradise. It is all filled with magical treasure. I’ll tell you a secret, the treasure I care for spans both the heavens and the earth. You see, we are at the place where spirit, breath and matter intersect. Where the living beings of earth and the animating forces of the divine join in harmony.

It is so hard to look at your holy book. I can’t imagine why I keep getting blamed for . . .well . . . just about everything. It’s strange that your world wants to connect me with curses as I am the giver of life. In fact, did you know that my name Eve means life. I don’t understand what has become of you, my children. It is said that I brought a curse to humanity. Do you see life as a curse? Let me tell you a bit about myself. Perhaps then you will see me differently.

Poetry by Mary Saracino

Mary Saracino’s statement on poetry: Poetry is based on intuition, emotion, something that is not really express-able other than through the poem. It’s a dialogue or conversation between the poet and the Soul (the collective unconscious, in my opinion), which then presents itself to the world. It can be a powerful medium for restoring, reviving, and revitalizing the memories of the Divine Female and reclaiming female sovereignty. Our planet, humankind and our plant and animal kin are in dire need of a paradigm shift, returning us to the time before patriarchy defiled women and usurped the natural order of the world.

Resurrection By Mary Saracino

Deep in the coils of memory our DNA
sings ancient songs of life, death, regeneration.
We each turn on our own axis,
as the Earth turns through her seasons,
winter’s fallow followed by spring’s eternal greening.
All sacred litanies arise from her soil,
take to the sky, return their blessings
to the wells, the rivers, the oceans.
Why can’t we remember?
Our souls are hung on crosses,
our limbs bound, our hands and feet
nailed to unrelenting dogma,
our tender ribs pierced with thorny spears,
our vulva-wounds ooze with bloody amnesia.
We have forgotten where we come from:
the dank caves of consciousness
littered with the bones of
stone age lovers painted ochre-red
to honor menstrual blood, the original river,
to honor, too, its womb-source, our primal passageway
the portal from which we all emerged, mouths open, wailing
for our mother’s breast,
seeking the milk that sustains us.
Like spring we are born again and again;
we circumnavigate our lives, spiraling forward,
circling back, orbiting our hearts
until we open to the sun
like red tulips in a once-fallow field,
dancing in the breeze, loose with joy,
sharing our subterranean secret,
reviving the buried bulb’s dormant hopes,
reveling in our resurrection.

Previously published: “Resurrection,” April 5, 2013

Subterranean Rage By Mary Saracino

Deeper than bone
deeper than muscle or sinew
or tenacious tendon
this howl of ages
rivers through bloodlines, ancient as oceans
salty as the primeval seas
this is what happens to women who
out-step their bounds
dare to be bold, brazen
speak up, name the subterfuge
women who grit their warriors’ teeth
fight on, for their children
their lovers, their nation
their homes, their hearts’ desires
branded as heretics: witch, bitch, cunt, whore
they race through forests and fields
trying to outrun the acrid scent of their own sweat
running from the hellish hounds
the priestly proclamations
the wrenching bite of the strappado*
running for their lives
caught between sinner or saint
rarely allowed sovereignty over Self
over mind & womb, over laws meant to undo them
Thousands of straggled cats launched the Plague
tender necks swinging from tree limbs
flaccid, cold paws an omen: the rats will have their day
Crucibles of change, cauldrons
of sorrow, voices stymied for ions by the threat of extinction
womb-wisdom silenced by public outcry
burned at the stake of cultural conditioning
the subterranean outrage
seeps out, sharp as knives
sharp as memory
sharp as justice denied
sharp as the bloodied knives
eviscerating their midnight powers
Deep is this grief
Deep this anger
A dirge of rage lost to the winds of time.
The weeping memory wails, still.
Hear it the moonless night sky,
touch it in the hot light of noon
smell it in the poisoned soil
taste it on your remembering tongue
see it in the burning irises
that bear witness to this unyielding genocide.

* Strappado is a form of torture, employed by the Inquisitional tribunals against women accused of witchcraft. Victims were suspended in the air by means of a rope attached to their hands which were tied behind their backs, causing their arms to be dislocated.

Previously published: “Subterranean Rage,” October 30, 2013

Tharros, Sardegna By Mary Saracino

The stones share their secrets with the sea,
the brilliant blue sky, the tasseled grasses,
the trees—and any humans who will listen—
defying history’s edicts to remain silent.
Parched by the wind and the rain,
the stones speak fiercely of love and of times lost
as outcroppings of brilliant wildflowers
sing sacred songs in the sunlight.
This ancient place is nestled
against a rugged shoreline,
its far-away culture castaway like a forgotten dream,
buried beneath rocks and earth;
here, the outcast souls bloom once more
in the red poppies
whose bloody tongues
whisper: “Remember, remember, remember.”

Author’s note: This poem was inspired by the ruins at Tharros, Sardegna during a visit I made in 2004 as part of a Dark Mother Study tour of that island led by Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum. I think of these ancient places as sanctuaries, containers, wombs, collecting and holding the memory of the Great Cosmic Mother; I see the flowers, the red poppies (sacred to Astarte) sprouting up among the archeological ruins, as Her resurging; blood red poppies, blood lines, blood flow; menstrual memory, carriers of life of memory, of lineage—blood-red, like flowery blooming tongues, telling their stories; reclaiming their truths; waving in the breeze, bending into the wind, but not submitting, allowing the wind to carry their message, carry their poppy seeds of memory out across the fields; kernels of memory—like an amnesic remembering, then speaking.

Previously published: “Tharros”, June 19, 2015

Mary Saracino is a novelist, poet, and memoir writer who lives in New Mexico. Her most recent novel is Heretics: A Love Story (Pearlsong Press 2014). Her novel, The Singing of Swans (Pearlsong Press 2006) was a 2007 Lambda Literary Awards Finalist. She is the author of the novels, No Matter What and Finding Grace, and the memoir Voices of the Soft-bellied Warrior. Mary’s short story, “Vicky’s Secret,” earned the 2007 Glass Woman Prize. Her poetry, fiction and creative nonfiction have been published in a variety of literary and cultural journals and anthologies, online and in print.

She Spoke My Name: Finding the Feminine Divine in Silence, Fire, and Verse by Madeleine F. White

Two years ago I was in Pembrokeshire in South Wales. The retreat I’d taken myself to consisted of a collection of stone and flint buildings half way up a mountain and set around a farmhouse and chapel. I had come to find a way through my writer’s’ block and also to deal with a couple of really painful family issues.

My room was only a half corridor away from the chapel itself. It was four o’clock in the morning and because I was quite close to the kitchen on the other side I had my earplugs in. Despite all this, on the second night, I quite clearly heard a woman’s voice calling “Madeleine,” loudly enough to wake me and send me looking down a deserted corridor. It was not imagined or metaphorical, but distinct and unmistakably real. The experience startled, not because I was afraid but because I recognised the truth of it. This familiar, maternal and sacred truth led directly to the writing of Maiden Mother Crone, my second poetry collection just a few months later as well as a resolution of the two other issues that had weighed so heavily on my mind.

As a Hen Gathers by Elanur Williams

**Gustav Klimt, *Garden Path with Chickens*, 1916**

In the early years of my childhood, my family lived for a short time on a poultry farm in Bandırma. Hens wandered freely, unconfined. The contours of that land have long since changed, replaced by refrigerated depots and industrial freezers that hum along the highways, the relentless march of capital. In the Gospels of Luke and Matthew, Jesus laments: “How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing.” These days, I find myself returning to the image of the mother hen—a figure who embodies a special wisdom that is seldom named, yet deeply and instinctively known.

Although I did not have a religious upbringing, I grew up embracing aspects of many faiths. My spiritual background is Alevi, and after inviting the Presbyterian faith into my life following my marriage, I find these layered identities influence each other in ways that are both intricate and transformative. In her sermon Who Is Jesus? Mother Hen, Reverend Agnes Norfleet lingers on the vulnerability of the mother hen metaphor, questioning what strength a hen can possibly offer in the face of the fox—Herod—and, more broadly, in the face of violence at large. Reverend Norfleet asks why Jesus does not invoke a more forceful or fiercer maternal figure—a lion, perhaps, or a bear? What does this choice imply for our activism and understandings of leadership? What unique wisdom does the mother hen offer?

Three poems by Rebecca Rogerson

Don’t Take Me to Church

He never let me eat communion because I wasn’t a catholic, but it was okay for me to eat his dick. My tiny palms forced to stroke him, the same dextrous hands that coloured in the lines.

I knew his God wasn’t my God. I knew she saw everything there was to see and that he wouldn’t reach salvation; no matter how many Hail Marys he said at mass in Ireland.

The Virgin Mary knew what he stole from me, what they steal from all of us.

I couldn’t fall apart on Sundays at noon when he took me to church—before he took me home after he did what he did—to the little Jewish girl who didn’t know she was Jewish.

I couldn’t remember it because I buried it in Survive, until, it was resurrected by nightmares and demons who professed caring and brought me to altars of despair to vomit up all the darkness, and when there was no more left to cleanse or tear out; light ripped in.

No one talks about the embarrassment that goes along with the telling, sharing and surfacing of sexual violence. How it comes up, how it comes back. How we’re always haunted by the deadbeat dead and grabby grandfathers who try to reach from there into here, pretending they are made of heaven.

I fled a friend’s choir concert because perpetrators keep stealing time, moments, sleep, joy, and friendship, in churches and baths. On my flight, I hunted for nature, soil and anything else that felt most alive in the hilly town of Nelson. Pretending I was like everyone else, I hid the panic that strikes broken hearts.