Sinister Wisdom, A journal for the Lesbian Imagination in the Arts and Politics

Sinister Wisdom, A Journal for the Lesbian Imagination in the Arts and. Politics

Sinister Wisdom, a journal from California that produces treasures for lesbians not only in the United States, has come up with a new issue written and edited by old lesbians/dykes. It is a pleasure to read the short stories, reflections and poems. Being 24 years of age I felt encouraged, inspired and joyful about the possible perspective of living a long life as a lesbian.

A number of texts look back to the decades of struggle that old lesbians went through. Del Martin and Phillis Lyon write, "Lesbians of our generation who have survived to old age have lived through the McCarthyism of the '50s, purges of homosexuals from the U.S. State Department and the armed services, police raids of Gay bars and private parties, release of names and addresses of those arrested to newspapers and employers."

A good number of life-stories recount homophobia, insecurity, hiding and then coming out with the women's movement in the '70s and '80s. But we also learn about heterosexual marriages and then radical changes women underwent in their fifties to seventies. We read stories of young lesbians in a time long passed. Stories of young women and girls creating, imagining their lesbian world with no lesbian movement to look to for inspiration and support.

Pat Pomerlau wrote the enchanting short story `Amelia Earhart Didn't Cook', a description of the world of the girl Patsy through her own eyes. The girl's favorite place is up the fig tree at the back of the house with her two favorite friend: Amelia Earhart, the fascinating woman who one day disappeared in an airplane but who comes back secretly to visit her little friend in the figtree, "Amelia Earhart wore trousers, cut her hair short and had a man helper, and she wasn't his wife."

Her other favorite guest was Eleonor Roosevelt herself, even if Eleanor was despised by Patsy's family and neighborhood for her alleged control over her husband. Patsy writes, "It was just another reason why FDR wasn't a good president. That Eleanor!...