Lucille Clifton's "Homage to My Hips" is a wonderfully
expressive poem, mostly because of who the speaker is. The poem is written from a
first-person point of view, obviously, as she calls them "my" hips. Everything she says
from then on regarding those hips refers to her. This poem is an "homage," which is
something like a tribute. The owner of these hips has them and is proud of
them.
The first lines of the poem are
clear:
these
hips are big hips.
they need space to
move around
in.
We take that as a
literal representation, of course, but there is a figurative meaning as well, which can
be found in the next lines:
they need space to
move around
in.
they don't fit into little
petty
places.
Notice the use of the
word "petty." This is an interesting choice because it has little to do with any kind
of actual space. It's more a reference to petty (small-minded) thinking, which says
women are supposed to be built in a certain way, behave in a certain way, and look a
certain way. Her hips will not be confined to such pettiness. The next lines affirm
that assertion that she (and her hips) are an unstoppable
force:
these
hips
are free hips.
they don't like to be held back.
these
hips have never been enslaved,
they go where they want to go
they
do what they want to do.
The
speaker of this poem is well aware of both her physical presence and her power as a
person and a woman, specifically. The final lines indicate she can accomplish great
things with her figuratively "magical" hips.
these hips are magic hips.
i have known
them
to put a spell on a man and
spin him like a
top
This speaker is a
presence to be reckoned with in any world. Clifton's use of synechdoche here (using the
hips to represent the whole person) is effective because it gives us both the visual of
a woman with prodigious hips making her presence known and felt in this world where
small hips are valued and the idea that this is a strong woman who is free to accomplish
anything she chooses to do or be.
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