Donora Hillard explains it all

In a self-interview with the Nervous Breakdown—an online magazine featuring emerging poets, authors and artists—feminist poet Donora Hillard gets intimate. She shares the story behind her new collection, Theology of the Body, which was recently released by Gold Wake Press. She also lets readers know what she keeps on her nightstand (“Anne Carson’s Nox, black lacquer, a Civil War-era glass eye, a sickly vintage-looking lamp, and Sephora cosmetics such as NARS blush in Orgasm.”) Theology of the Body, a feminist response to the Pope and other Catholic leaders, challenges the misrepresentation of women’s bodies in their teachings.

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The poem featured here is from your collection Theology of the Body, which was recently released by Gold Wake Press . Care to talk about it?

As part of a teaching position I once held, I was forced to attend a lecture by Christopher West, who’s considered an authority on Pope John Paul II’s teachings on adultery, contraception, marriage, virginity, and other matters of the body. At one point he said, "Ladies, your bodies don’t make much sense on their own, do they?" I knew I had to respond to that question in some capacity. As such, Theology of the Body contains quotes from the Pope and West along with other religious figures juxtaposed against poems that are unorthodox in nature. It’s my way of saying to those men, Look, what you’re forcing upon people just doesn’t function in reality, especially where women are concerned.