Mal De Ojo and Other Poems

Female sexuality makes people uncomfortable, and, from this fact, rises the Madonna and whore dichotomy, as it allows for the division and neat categorisation of chaste and promiscuous women that keeps female sexuality in check. In both the Madonna and the whore, the sexual facet is outside of the woman’s control, and both are objects of desire for the heterosexual male – very much like the femme fatale. I have here three poems that reflect on female figures and how they have been viewed through their sexual acts, and their vilification or idolisation.