For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide, When the Rainbow Is Enuf by Ntozake Shange - Essay Example

Ntozake’s choreopoem describes black women’s continued search for their identity, racial prejudice, poverty, and their mistreatment by men. In the latter, men rape and neglect their women to cause unwanted abortions and broken marriages. Ntozake acts as a voice of these women in order to show the world the relevance of human rights in terms of gender equality within the black population across the globe. According to Tillis (8), the poet’s works are remarkable since Ntozake writes from her own experience of male oppression and neglect. After her broken marriage, she even tried to commit suicide several times. Hence, such tribulations make her poems genuine and comparable to real-life examples in the modern-day world.

Consequently, the focus on different stories by the seven women of color in the poem enables a diverse range of women to link to the stories. For instance, the Lady in brown tries to run away from gender inequalities in her home only to experience them in her destination. She sees the world as full of racism and prejudice, where she dreams of a place where women enjoy similar rights as their men counterparts. This story seems appropriate to ‘open the eyes of the men and make them realize the value of gender equality. In fact, the current rise in women activists and feminists shows that such gender-based abuse has been a significant problem around the globe.

However, the poem also urges women to play their part and refuse negative male masculinity. For instance, the Lady in yellow tries to find a solution to her metaphysical predicament by refusing to persevere men’s abuse of her love. By doing so, women can relieve some of their male oppression and live their own lives. However, then men also should try to understand the women's predicaments. Masculinity and feminism are different and each group should play its part. For instance, the husband of the Lady in yellow refuses to see her meaningful and good intentions even after years of emotional torment in their relationship. Moreover, this Lady tells other black women that the key aspects of being black are courage, open-mindedness, and strength (Shange, 45). Hence, they should not tolerate prejudice from their men.  

At the end of the play, the women come together to show the power of womanhood (Shange, 63). Each color has different personalities and emotional tribulations. However, when they join hands, they create a formidable voice of protesting against oppression from their men. Nonetheless, the poem is mainly directed at black women and men because they are the community where the majority of the oppression occurs. The whites have already accepted gender equality whereby their men understand and appreciate women. Furthermore, with more human rights activists, like Shange, coming up, there is huge potential for such problems becoming outdated.