Happy Birthday to Alice Walker

Alice Walker turns 66 today.

When Salinger died a few days ago, I wrote about how The Catcher in the Rye was one of those books that changed my life. The Color Purple is another one of those books, for completely different reasons. Whereas The Catcher in the Rye taught me the value of re-reading, it was The Color Purple that made me realize the universality of human experience. Calie might have been a black lesbian growing up in the early 20th century south, and I might have been a 20-year old middle-class guy coming of age in the midwest, but I had some Celie in me. I got her, and never would have imagined that I could. Before that, I pretty much read literature of those who looked like me, but Walker extended the world of reading way beyond myself and my own experience. But, ironically, it taught me that human experience is universal.

Plus, it's such a beautiful, gut-wrenching read. Way, way better than the movie.

Then there was that time I heard Alice Walker speak in college. It confirmed my desire to be a teacher and change the world. I've continued to read her work whenever she writes a new book (The Way Forward With a Broken Heart is another amazing read. Especially if you have a broken heart.)

Here's my favorite Alice Walker poem. Happy Birthday to one of my favorites!

I Said to Poetry

I said to Poetry:"I'm finished
with you."
Having to almost die
before some wierd light
comes creeping through
is no fun.
"No thank you, Creation,
no muse need apply.
Im out for good times--
at the very least,
some painless convention."

Poetry laid back
and played dead
until this morning.
I wasn't sad or anything,
only restless.

Poetry said: "You remember
the desert, and how glad you were
that you have an eye
to see it with? You remember
that, if ever so slightly?"
I said: "I didn't hear that.
Besides, it's five o'clock in the a.m.
I'm not getting up
in the dark
to talk to you."

Poetry said: "But think about the time
you saw the moon
over that small canyon
that you liked so much better
than the grand one--and how suprised you were
that the moonlight was green
and you still had
one good eye
to see it with

Think of that!"

"I'll join the church!" I said,
huffily, turning my face to the wall.
"I'll learn how to pray again!"

"Let me ask you," said Poetry.
"When you pray, what do you think
you'll see?"

Poetry had me.

"There's no paper
in this room," I said.
"And that new pen I bought
makes a funny noise."

"Bullshit," said Poetry.
"Bullshit," said I.