Small Bird Movements : feminist prose poetics and the poet as shaman

Abstract

Small Bird Movements follows the poet past youth to a budding awareness of feminist issues. The manuscript's four sections detail the structure of a bird feather, ending with the section Flight to illustrate this change in the poets view on the world. Through verse and prose poetry the manuscript highlights the personal female but also global women's issues, often times stemming from violence against minority women. Using the text Borderlands, by Gloria Anzaldúa as a theoretical base, the manuscript details imagery, rather than societal labels, as a method to construct identity to better reflect the individual. The poet as shaman allows for development of community through writing and shared imagery. For the community, the poet creates writing, but also transfers language to the population. In Small Bird Movements, the poet strives for strong female voice as a tool to challenge a patriarchal capitalist agenda. Rather than alienate, the poets' goal is to connect, utilizing the oral roots of poetry and the form of the prose poem. Often this combination is used by minority poets to expand language and experiment with form to transgress patriarchal discourse. Small Bird Movements focuses on themes of youth, violence against females, methods of identity construction, and female agency with the intent to emphasize construction of identity and the value of female concerns, personal or global. The themes found in the manuscript reflect an enactment of Anzaldúa's Nepantla, construction of identity through change and imagery.