'A Whole New Poetry Beginning Here': Claiming Language for Survival in the Works of Adrienne Rich, Joy Harjo and Mitsuye Yamada

Audre Lorde has said 'Poetry is not a luxury'; Adrienne Rich writes 'Poetry is. . . survival.' (What is Found. . . 215). Poetry is a conscientious act, a recording of our understanding of our world, our experience, and of our very existence. Writing poetry we claim, however softly, the validity of what we feel, think and experience. For women, for people of color, for anyone whom the majority in society seeks to silence and discount, writing is an act of survival, a refusal to be silenced and made invisible.