this is the first line of a poem I haven’t written yet:
the consistent experience is the mother.
maybe this will turn into a poem about “dame lorraine” mas (as in mask or masquerade). to start the KAISO! ca’naval series i’m posting an excerpt describing the ancestry of “dame lorraine.” i’ve seen many non-Caribbean people give male masqueraders dressed as women strange looks at Caribbean Carnival parades in the US.
men “cross-dressing” at carnival – sometimes with next to nothing on, at other times in homely dresses and church hats, baby doll and stroller abound – is just one of the many strange and wonderful aspects of our culture. to me this was just another unexplained part of carnival, but now i understand that it all began with mothers, the consistent experience. here is Liverpool’s description:
men “cross-dressing” at carnival – sometimes with next to nothing on, at other times in homely dresses and church hats, baby doll and stroller abound – is just one of the many strange and wonderful aspects of our culture. to me this was just another unexplained part of carnival, but now i understand that it all began with mothers, the consistent experience. here is Liverpool’s description:
“In South West Nigeria, and in neighboring Benin, the “Gelede” masquerader pays tribute to “mothers” who are believed to possess spiritual life force. These “mothers,” the South West Yorubas believe control life, fertility and death, and as such, it is necessary to appease them…It is said that a woman, Yewejabe, first danced the Gelede, but, nevertheless, only men do so today…Dances are dictated by drums , satirical speeches, female costumes emphasizing buttocks and breasts, and dancing in pairs…The evidence suggests that the transition of this mask tradition from Africa to the Caribbean accompanied the enslaved Africans, for in Trinidad, there developed among Africans the “Dame Lorraine” festival” (Rituals of Power & Rebellion 64)
so de next time yuh see a man in a stuffed bra and panty, yuh know where he comin from.
Zahra Gordon 
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