Audre Lorde

For those who know me, Sister Audre Lorde, is an instrumental force in my writing life. I am indebted to her for shaping my socio-political, feminist consciousness. This blog is dedicated to her and inspired by her wise words in one of her most courageous books, The Cancer Journals. She died on November 17, 1992 in St. Croix, after a 14-year struggle with breast cancer. She was 58. Rest In Peace, Sister Lorde!!

She wrote with a truthfulness that pierced our hearts and opened our eyes to the realities we hoped to long deny. Lorde was a fearless warrior and one of the firsts to write about her experiences as a Black Lesbian Feminist living with Breast Cancer. In fact, she was one of the first women in the U.S. to write about living with Breast Cancer. Ofcourse, in this white supremacist capitalist patriarchal society she is not regarded for this. But we know the truth.

Below is an excerpt from The Cancer Journals.

"Sometimes fear stalks me like another malignancy, sapping energy and power and attention from my work. A cold becomes sinister: a cough, lung cancer; a bruise leukemia. Those fears are most powerful when they are not given voice, and close upon their heels comes the fury that I cannot shake them. I am learning to live beyond fear by living through it, and in the process learning to turn fury at my own limitations into some more creative energy. I realize that if I wait until I am no longer afraid to act, write, speak, be, I'll be sending messages on a Ouija board, cryptic complaints from the other side. When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less important whether or not I am unafraid." pp.13