Performance poet Williams delivers dramatic reading

Poet and performance artist Kammika Williams, speaking Wednesday night, said that her children are her inspiration and that she writes her poetry to teach her children about the black woman's experience. Williams' poetry reading, delivered in the Harold Prince Theater in the Annenberg Center, was the fourth and final event in Alpha Kappa Alpha's salute to Black History Month. Over 50 people listened intently as Williams presented her poetry, interspersed with humor and social commentary. Her first piece, entitled A Woman Rarely Speaks, won the 1988 Women's League for Peace and Freedom Award. The title appeared as a frequent refrain within the poem as Williams expressed her anguish at having to keep running to survive and not having the time to think about all the problems of the world. She expressed powerful emotions as she gestured to the audience to show her frustration that "A woman rarely thinks . . . about just living." One of Williams's most moving pieces told the story of a young slave girl who screams "Mama, don't leave me!" while she is being sold on the auction block and separated from her family. Williams shifted to a narrative perspective to say that slave girls were often raped by their owners and that "a young Negro slave girl rarely lived to grow old." In many of her pieces, Williams clearly portrayed the oppression which black women have been faced with throughout the course of history. Williams' bond with her children was placed within a historical context in "Braided Hair Number Three." As she talked of her exhilaration at being able to brush her daughters' hair, she recalled that this is something which mothers have been doing for generations. She used gestures and movements to bring back memories of her mother and grandmother as she considered how times have changed for the better. She drew on her heritage to speak of the years of slavery and oppression when "Black women couldn't comfort their children without fear," touchingly concluding, "Your hope goes on, grandmother." College senior Peaches Milton, one of the event's organizers, said she could identify with Williams. "I felt as if I was living each of her roles," Milton said. "She did a great job of bringing us into her world." "I loved it," said College junior Sivakami Thayu. "I thought she brought in historical experience and related it to the present in a very exciting way. It was incredible." I think people who missed this missed a real treat," said College senior Roslyn Evans.

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