The Lost Generation

The poem titled ‘ii. Improvisation” is a cautionary narrative in which Ntozake Shange weaves a generational pattern of sexism, gender, and voice that follows women like shadows throughout their lives. In this poem, she begins with the phrase “there is something caught in my throat” and this imagery of choking is continuously repeated throughout every stanza. The significance of this phrase indicates her lack of voice due to the presence of male domination that consumes her physically and mentally. However, she refuses to allow this male subjection to control her daughter as well. She repeatedly “checks” on her daughter to ensure that she is still “sleeping” and not experiencing the atrocities that she is. This desperate plea by Shange to secure the innocence of her daughter ultimately reveals this poem as a vision of collective womanhood and identity. This “daughter” is a symbol of younger women who have been spared from the degradation of their ancestors due to their strength and sheer will to survive. The ending where Shange refuses materialistic items such as flowers, white wine, or a house and instead states that she wants “this place out of [her] throat.” By ending this poem with the same phrase she begins with unveils the true cost of freedom and how women struggle not only for themselves, but for their survival as a collective identity in the past, present, and future.

I choose the song “ I Remember” by Lauryn Hill preformed live, because I feel as though the tones of ancestry that this song exudes runs parallel with this specific poem. Furthermore in the lyrics, Hill’s voice noticeably cracks during her singing and it reminded me of Shange’s phrase “there is something stuck in my throat”. Ultimately this song demonstrates a similar vulnerability that Shange brilliantly illustrates in “ii. Improvisations” through the flaws and hardships of womanhood, but how hope still somehow remains at the end of both the song and the poem like a lighthouse at the bay.