Sphere Factor

One of the most common stereotypes for women is that they belong to the private sphere (ie home and all things domestic), making them incapable of participating in the public sphere (ie debates). Categorized as only interested in trivial matters, identified only in reference to a male, and "objects" viewed in the male gaze, these representations of women cannot be further from the truth. Here are two poems resisting such representations, written by Joi Barrios.

The first one reflects how women too can participate on issues concerning the nation:

YANKEE DOODLE/LAYAS

I am a Filipina woman.
And in my country
There are three thousand American soldiers.
This is my song,
My song of satire, my lament,
My call to action.

Yankee doodle came to town
Riding on a pony
Killed and maimed and tortured us
And called it a… democracy.

America, America
How easily you forget, America.
You traded lives for power.
What is the value of life
In a poor country?
The value of life
Of a person of color?
We shall forever bleed.
Filipinos marked
By the violence of your war.

Yankee doodle, keep it up,
Yankee doodle dandy,
Burn the village and the town,
And with your gun be handy.

Balangiga, 1901.
The bells signal a call to arms
Remove your disguises,
Bandit and hero are one,
Attack the enemy,
And plunge into his heart
The dagger, the spear,
Anger and revolt!
Let the bells ring!
Music that threatens and condemns
Leave, leave, leave our land!

Yankee doodle comes again
Riding on a fighter
Brings his war to my country
And calls it a … democracy.

America, America
Off to war always, America.
Trading blood for oil.
My country is not a playground
For your tanks and soldiers.
A nation is not just land,
Mountains, sea.
We die with your bullets,
We perish with your bombs.
We live in poverty,
We are people of color,
Yet we sing of dignity,
Leave, America,
Leave my country, leave.

Yankee doodle keeps it up
Brandishing his weapon.
War games are fun games!
And you can call it… DEMOCRACY!

In the United States of America
The bells reside.
A symbol of their grief
And our rare victory.
Soldiers endlessly march
Back to our land.
Playing war games.
Death games.
And the woman raped
Makes conquest complete.
Shall our voices ring as bells?
They have brought the war into our land!
What greater tragedy do we yet await?
How many shall perish in the war?
Ring the bells! Ring the bells!
Leave, leave, leave our land!

***

The second uses war as a metaphor for being a woman, a perfect sentiment for the materialist feminist perspective:

TO BE A WOMAN IS TO LIVE AT A TIME OF WAR

To be a woman
Is to live at a time of war.

I grew up
with fear beside me,
uncertain of a future,
hinged to the men of my life;
father, brother,
husband, son.
I was afraid to be alone.

To be a mother
Is to look at poverty at its face.
For the cruelty of war
Lies not on heads that roll,
But tables always empty.
How does one look for food for the eldest
As a baby sucks at one’s breast?

No moment is without danger.
In one’s own home,
To speak, to defy
Is to challenge violence itself.
In the streets,
Walking at nightfall
Is to invite a stranger’s attack.
In my country
To fight against oppression
Is to lay down one’s life for the struggle.

I seek to know this war.
To be a woman is a never ceasing battle.

Feminist, activist, and poet Joi Barrios