"Seed" is from a book-length exploration of unmanageable women of fairy tale and myth. The poem's speaker has retained a certain wildness of spirit despite edicts to be "good"; she has nursed her grievances until she is both scintillant and dangerous. This idea cross-pollinated with the history of pearls as signifiers of political power for women; for example, the apocryphal story of Cleopatra dissolving a valuable pearl in a dish of milk.
Jeanne Obbard on "Seed" |
|
|
