31/08/2024
Mathematics is a Woman
Review by Kirstie Allen Yap
As a child, treasured moments with my mother were always paired with a soft, slow caress on my face. I would widen my eyes and ignore the world, all to savor the smoothness of her calluses and the dulled tip of her manicure on my waterline. Even then, I understood that there was something important in how she held me, how all the older women in my life held me. How we hold each other is written, read, and proven in Mathematics by a Woman.
Certainly, the book is about feminist endeavors. It is a love letter, a dissent, a conversation in the kitchen, and a finger to the face. Mostly, though, as all inspired work does, it is saying I burn. In each poem and essay, there is not a single pandering element. Nothing is easy to swallow, and it shouldn’t be because neither is ‘woman.’ Calm comfort, obvious obsolescence, or rough reflection may be to a reader. Still, it does not change that the book’s name concerns the complex individuality and diversity of women’s experiences.
Multiple women, divided aspects, added nuances, ‘less than’ or more of that. I admit ‘Mathematics’ is now an artful metaphor compared to my first impression, where I thought it was a cheap gimmick. To be described as something so systematic and worldwide, yet unsolvable and individual. Ever-progressing, confounding, arguably innate and learned. Clever, clever, the details you can miss or carefully kiss. Endearing is the passion that will, at the very least, convince the reader; the sincerity of the hopeful cry, “Woman, women, together, I see you! I love you!”. Maybe other messages are hidden behind multiple interpretations and mature tastes unbeknownst to me. Perhaps my limited view prevents me from taking the work as a whole, as is my excuse.
Nevertheless, it was the halfway point, specifically in Veil of Commitment, when I burst into tears and had to set the book down. People partly understand themselves and the world through the views of others, and dearly, I was especially stripped clean from the line, “She can’t trust the judges...”. Many facets of a woman are covered in the book: as a mother, artist, bride, art, wild, constrained—how she is seen, how women understand each other, how she may think she is not understood the way she wants to be, how she performs, molds, shatters, and is all the rage, scorn, and hope. She is a million equations, and she can prove it to no one but herself. She may only partly relate to women on a page; in other words, she dismisses a cheap gimmick. However, this is exactly the book’s point: she is infinite, regardless of the judges and her poor sense of self.
Needless to say, I’ve been called to reflect, feeling comforted and conversely repelled to dig deeper within some poems. Would it be embarrassing to say I don’t understand? Would it be worse to say I’m scared to? To read real and experienced truths, might I discover things about myself, other women, or my own self-induced ignorance? What do I really understand about myself as a woman? The book will ask you but cannot answer that question for anybody or even fully cover its expanse. Yet, in its glad existence, it is proof of the understanding women see in caressing their daughters’ faces and holding them tightly.
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Catch Glory Cabilete's Mathematics is a Woman (MIAW) at Pulong sa mga Alagad sa Obra's Booth in Cebu Arts Book Fair (CABF) today and tomorrow for discounts and a chance to get a signed copy.
Cebu Arts Book Fair features Cebuano artists and creatives in its celebration of Cebuano culture. This year, it is being held in Ayala Center Cebu from August 31 to September 1. Make sure to grace PALABRA booth when visiting this year's CABF. Get merch, stickers, goods, pre-loved books, and of couse, MIAW First Edition, for great deals!
See you there!
