Poem by Priscilla Denise Levertov

Hypocrite Women

Hypocrite women, how seldom we speak   
of our own doubts, while dubiously   
we mother man in his doubt!

And if at Mill Valley perched in the trees   
the sweet rain drifting through western air   
a white sweating bull of a poet told us

our cunts are ugly—why didn't we   
admit we have thought so too? (And   
what shame? They are not for the eye!)

No, they are dark and wrinkled and hairy,   
caves of the Moon ...          And when a   
dark humming fills us, a

coldness towards life,
we are too much women to   
own to such unwomanliness.

Whorishly with the psychopomp   
we play and plead—and say
nothing of this later.             And our dreams,

with what frivolity we have pared them   
like toenails, clipped them like ends of   
split hair.

1. What Were They Like?
2. The Ache of Marriage
3. Pleasures
4. At the Justice Department November 15, 1969
5. Goodbye to Tolerance

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