Womanhood
This work is a celebration of the power and excitement that the speaker finds in her own body. Importantly, while the poem acknowledges that others might be attracted to or drawn to the speaker's body—she notes that her hips can "put a spell on a man"—Clifton is primarily interested in exploring the speaker's love for her hips despite what others may think of them. The speaker's hips are personified, described as able to do what they want and able to influence the world without paying heed to externally imposed expectations or limits. Moreover, Clifton describes the way that these hips unabashedly seek out space in the world, unable to fit into "petty" places. Throughout the work, Clifton celebrates the speaker's femininity and her body as subjects rather than as objects, attending to the speaker's agency and power.
Race and Freedom
Importantly, the speaker's body is celebrated not only in the context of her womanhood but also in the implied context of her blackness. Clifton describes the way that the speaker's body belongs entirely to her, to use and enjoy as she sees fit. This is a radical viewpoint, antithetical to the historical reality of enslavement and the viewing of enslaved individuals as property. Clifton makes this juxtaposition explicit with the line "these hips have never been enslaved," as well as with the observation "these hips / are free hips." This celebration of blackness in the face of racism cannot be separated, in this work, from the celebration of womanhood in the face of sexism: the speaker takes note of multiple ways in which her own body might be restricted by both punishing expectations of femininity and by legal and literal bondage, but she asserts her freedom and strength nevertheless.
