Revolt From Hymen by Angela Manalang-Gloria
Revolt From Hymen
Angela Manalang-GloriaO to be free at last, to sleep at last
As infants sleep within the womb of rest!To stir and stirring find no blackness vast
With passion weighted down upon the breast,To turn the face this way and that and feel
No kisses festering on it like sores,To be alone at last, broken the seal
That marks the flesh no better than a whore’s!
MARGINALIA
Still on a high. I forgot how much I wrote back then, when I wasn’t conscious of what is and isn’t, when writing poetry was a ritual I had to do to exorcise demons and ghosts and old loves; not a craft, not work, not a discipline, not something I would have to share eventually to the rest of the world.
I am looking for Manalang-Gloria’s book but I can’t find it on my shelves. Have I lent it to someone I’m never going to see again in this lifetime? How could I let that happen? How can I just let people walk away?
ABOUT ANGELA MANALANG-GLORIA
Angela Manalang-Gloria, born Angela Marie Legaspi Manalang on August 24, 1907, in Guagua, Pampanga, the Republic of the Philippines, was one of the major Filipina poets of the early twentieth century. The author of Poems (Self-published, 1940), she was well-known by her peers, especially for her controversial poem “Revolt of the Hymen” which protested marital rape. She died on August 19, 1995. (Source)
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ENDNOTES
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imari
thanks for posting these poem..I’ve used it in my report..that talks about feminists approach..
joy antonette
been a fan of this poem.