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Waiting in the Wings: Portrait of a Queer Motherhood
In a series of journal entries—some original passages, others revisited and expanded in retrospect—Cherrié Moraga details her experiences with pregnancy, birth, and the early years of lesbian parenting.
With the premature birth of her son―when HIV-related mortality rates were at their highest―Moraga, a new mother at 40-years-old, was forced to confront the fragile volatility of life and death; in these recorded dreams and reflections, her terror and resilience are made palpable. The particular challenges of queer parenting prove transformative as Moraga navigates her intersecting roles as mother, child, lover, friend, artist, activist, and more.
With an updated introduction and other additions, including an afterword by Rafael Angel Moraga, this revised 25th anniversary edition of Waiting in the Wings is thoughtful and emotive, with prose that is sharp and beautifully written, from the voice of a beloved and incomparable writer.
With the premature birth of her son―when HIV-related mortality rates were at their highest―Moraga, a new mother at 40-years-old, was forced to confront the fragile volatility of life and death; in these recorded dreams and reflections, her terror and resilience are made palpable. The particular challenges of queer parenting prove transformative as Moraga navigates her intersecting roles as mother, child, lover, friend, artist, activist, and more.
With an updated introduction and other additions, including an afterword by Rafael Angel Moraga, this revised 25th anniversary edition of Waiting in the Wings is thoughtful and emotive, with prose that is sharp and beautifully written, from the voice of a beloved and incomparable writer.
160 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1997
9 people are currently reading
651 people want to read
About the author
Cherríe L. Moraga
34 books366 followersCherríe Lawrence Moraga is a Chicana writer, feminist activist, poet, essayist, and playwright. She is part of the faculty at Stanford University in the Department of Drama and Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity. Her works explore the ways in which gender, sexuality and race intersect in the lives of women of color.
Moraga was one of the few writers to write and introduce the theory on Chicana lesbianism. Her interests include the intersections of gender, sexuality, and race, particularly in cultural production by women of color. There are not many women of color writing about issues that queer women of color face today: therefore, her work is very notable and important to the new generations. In the 1980s her works started to be published. Since she is one of the first and few Chicana/Lesbian writers of our time, she set the stage for younger generations of other minority writers and activists.
Moraga has taught courses in dramatic arts and writing at various universities across the United States and is currently an artist in residence at Stanford University. Her play, Watsonville: Some Place Not Here, performed at the Brava Theatre Company of San Francisco in May, 1996, won the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Fund for New American Plays Award, from the Kennedy center for the Performing Arts. Barbara Smith, Audre Lorde and Moraga started Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press in 1983, a group which did not discriminate against homosexuality, class, or race. it is the first publisher dedicated to the writing of women of color in the United States.
Moraga is currently involved in a Theatre communications group and was the recipient of the NEA Theatre Playwriting Fellowship Award Her plays and publications have won and received national recognition including a TCG Theatre Residency Grant, a National Endowment for the art fellowship for play writing and two Fund for New American Plays Awards in 1993. She was awarded the United States artist Rockefeller Fellowship for literature in 2007.In 2008 she won a Creative Work Fund Award. The following year, in 2009 she received a Gerbode-Hewlett foundation grant for play writing.
(from Wikipedia)
Moraga was one of the few writers to write and introduce the theory on Chicana lesbianism. Her interests include the intersections of gender, sexuality, and race, particularly in cultural production by women of color. There are not many women of color writing about issues that queer women of color face today: therefore, her work is very notable and important to the new generations. In the 1980s her works started to be published. Since she is one of the first and few Chicana/Lesbian writers of our time, she set the stage for younger generations of other minority writers and activists.
Moraga has taught courses in dramatic arts and writing at various universities across the United States and is currently an artist in residence at Stanford University. Her play, Watsonville: Some Place Not Here, performed at the Brava Theatre Company of San Francisco in May, 1996, won the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Fund for New American Plays Award, from the Kennedy center for the Performing Arts. Barbara Smith, Audre Lorde and Moraga started Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press in 1983, a group which did not discriminate against homosexuality, class, or race. it is the first publisher dedicated to the writing of women of color in the United States.
Moraga is currently involved in a Theatre communications group and was the recipient of the NEA Theatre Playwriting Fellowship Award Her plays and publications have won and received national recognition including a TCG Theatre Residency Grant, a National Endowment for the art fellowship for play writing and two Fund for New American Plays Awards in 1993. She was awarded the United States artist Rockefeller Fellowship for literature in 2007.In 2008 she won a Creative Work Fund Award. The following year, in 2009 she received a Gerbode-Hewlett foundation grant for play writing.
(from Wikipedia)
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews
April 22, 2020
How is this beautiful, genre-bending memoir about the possibilities of queer motherhood, family, and futurity not in print? The obvious comparison is with Maggie Nelson's near-canonical "The Argonauts," but Moraga's vision is somehow more intimate and more universal. Whereas Nelson struggles with intellectual elitism (citing Foucault, Sedgwick, Butler, etc.), as well as with "speaking for" trans folks and other identity groups, Moraga's narrative focus creates a richer, more immediate experience without intellectualizing. The political transgressiveness and theoretical frameworks are all there, but Moraga leaves them to be uncovered by the reader instead of pasting them in the margins. This a memoir at heart.
January 25, 2024
I admire cherrie moraga so much I’d read her shopping list without blinking
February 7, 2025
"This too, will pass."
Cherrie Moraga writes about things you did not know you needed to read. But most important, she writes Mexican, woman, lesbian, mother.
Cherrie Moraga writes about things you did not know you needed to read. But most important, she writes Mexican, woman, lesbian, mother.
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June 16, 2020What did you read? I read Waiting in the Wings by Cherrie Moraga, a Chicana poet from California. I was really gripped by the book, though I found the memoir to be slightly drawn out by the end of it. The book was an account of her experience getting pregnant and giving birth and how being a lesbian, Mexican poet shaped her experience. Moraga is a beautiful writer and illustrates the intensity, sensuality, and profound connection to life and death that is part of the journey of giving birth. She writes extensively about how familia sustains and challenges her identity as a mother and queer woman. She evokes the complexity of love in a complex and passionate way.
How does it relate to your work? I realized that all of the books I have read for book club up to know have been written by white men. So I’ve set out to change that. Cherrie Moraga’s strength and commitment to gaining power from inter-culturalism remind me of several of my co-workers at Casa de Esperanza. The way she processes her identities as a new mother were inspiring and gave me that much more respect for the choque of cultures that constantly forms the lives of people whose identities cross borders. The intimacy and passion with which she describes motherhood was powerful and beautiful. I don’t have any close family who has had children so it is a remote experience to me in many ways. All of these forces of life are an undercurrent in the organization I work with and, although the connections to technology are perhaps difficult to make directly, reading this book connected strongly to the work I do connecting with people and community.
Would you recommend it to others? Yes. Perhaps a little drawn out but I really enjoyed this book.
How does it relate to your work? I realized that all of the books I have read for book club up to know have been written by white men. So I’ve set out to change that. Cherrie Moraga’s strength and commitment to gaining power from inter-culturalism remind me of several of my co-workers at Casa de Esperanza. The way she processes her identities as a new mother were inspiring and gave me that much more respect for the choque of cultures that constantly forms the lives of people whose identities cross borders. The intimacy and passion with which she describes motherhood was powerful and beautiful. I don’t have any close family who has had children so it is a remote experience to me in many ways. All of these forces of life are an undercurrent in the organization I work with and, although the connections to technology are perhaps difficult to make directly, reading this book connected strongly to the work I do connecting with people and community.
Would you recommend it to others? Yes. Perhaps a little drawn out but I really enjoyed this book.
December 25, 2007
if I could give this two and a half stars, I would. Moraga's story of her pregnancy and early days (and then years) of motherhood are interesting and an easy read, but I never found myself satisfied by the book. Moraga relies heavily on her journal entries to make up the story and while her writing is personal and often very beautiful, at times I felt as though I were eavesdropping on someone's family gathering: I could sense the meaning behind the words, but just didn't have enough information or attachment for the story to really resonate with me.
January 19, 2021
A raw and poignant story of Cherrie's experience as a queer mother. When the book was written, it was not at all easy to be a lesbian, let alone a lesbian mother (even in San Francisco). Her work has helped to pave the way for the LGBTQ community to have a better life, simply by being who they are.
June 11, 2024
abbiamo idea di come articoleremo il capitolo della tesi? No! Mi sono vomitata addosso mentre leggevo per la seconda volta? Sì!
January 6, 2023
Moraga weaves together stories of love, family, motherhood, queerness, artistry, and death in this wonderful book. She details the extremes of love and fear and guilt new mothers are suddenly exposed to, especially those whose children begin their lives early and sickly and relatives of those whose lives are ending.
Her writing is beautiful, and she uses vivid imagery that is necessary to communicate her rich dreams, desires, and fears. On the topic of life’s beginnings and endings are indigenous knowledge of this cycle she writes: “This, the binding thread of birth/death/rebirth / that we mexicanos forever bemoan / and ever celebrate /dancing drunk con el gusto de la vida / around the lip / of a grave” (107).
She truly is a seer, able to honor people with what she notices with strong ability and how she writes her findings. Hers is not only a story of motherhood, but also of queer and indigenous families, of the height of the AIDS epidemic in the nineties, and of Xicana philosophies. She does great service to everybody whose story she brings together in this writing.
I would recommend this book to anybody, be you a parent, child, partner, or anybody who lives in ways that are unique and queer.
Her writing is beautiful, and she uses vivid imagery that is necessary to communicate her rich dreams, desires, and fears. On the topic of life’s beginnings and endings are indigenous knowledge of this cycle she writes: “This, the binding thread of birth/death/rebirth / that we mexicanos forever bemoan / and ever celebrate /dancing drunk con el gusto de la vida / around the lip / of a grave” (107).
She truly is a seer, able to honor people with what she notices with strong ability and how she writes her findings. Hers is not only a story of motherhood, but also of queer and indigenous families, of the height of the AIDS epidemic in the nineties, and of Xicana philosophies. She does great service to everybody whose story she brings together in this writing.
I would recommend this book to anybody, be you a parent, child, partner, or anybody who lives in ways that are unique and queer.
September 16, 2024
I have such complicated feelings about this book. I didn't love Moraga's writing. I found it so overwritten that it was hard to find any actual meaning in the language at times. I also don't like that Wings is focused entirely on pregnancy, birth, and postpartum, although I know those were unique experiences for the author. It's not really a portrait of a motherhood, which lasts a lifetime. It's a portrait of pregnancy, birth, and postpartum, none of which is essential to motherhood. I know that I'm bringing a lot of baggage to this book as a non-birthing mother myself, but I often felt incredibly sad for Ellen, who at times seemed to be an afterthought and at other times didn't seem present in the story at all. She is identified as Rafael Angel's mother, but we learn nothing about her relationship with him or with motherhood, and Moraga doesn't even seem curious about it. Not that the author is obligated to tell someone else's story in a book about her own, but it was painful for me to see the form of motherhood that more closely resembles mine pushed to the margins. The new foreword in the 25th anniversary edition pays lip service to trans identities, but it rings pretty hollow as an appendage to this book with a profoundly biological essentialist view of motherhood.
February 19, 2025
i loved this memoir so much. cherríe moraga has never ever failed me. gorgeous writing. incredibly profound and heart warming and gut wrenching. i think some portions of it were repetitive, and would go as far as to say they could’ve been deleted. also found some one liners to be a little confusing/strangely out of touch. but overall wonderful!
March 26, 2026
The best way I can describe this book is naked. It portrays with a shameless earnestness pregnancy, motherhood, love, life, death, and artistry that is franky astonishing. Change and mortality are not balked from, but they are also not easy skins to be stepped into at will. Cherríe Moraga tiene una corazón que puedes mirar dentro todos palabras, sustos, y sueños. Es una placer, as always.
January 8, 2024
I didnt have any expectations when it came to this book. Only to absorb. It definitely gave me perspective on a couple issues and showed such amazing familial strength, no matter where that family comes from
December 12, 2018
review to come
February 28, 2023
quick read & so worth it, so beautiful. You can tell Moraga was friends with Lorde
March 29, 2023
A delight to read, even as painful topics are discussed. Of particular interest to me is the juxtaposition of parenting with creative work, and wishing to parent within a particular lived culture.
March 21, 2024
utterly beautiful. raw and emotional.
July 7, 2024
The Year of Magical Thinking if it was good. I’ve always found it interesting how one’s mother tongue influences the cadences of their English, even when English is also their mother tongue.
September 9, 2024
“I know blood quantum does not determine parenthood any more than it determines culture. Still, I know blood matters. It just does not matter more than love.” (pp118)
October 9, 2024
beautiful and raw memoir made of journal entries that depict the possibilities of queer motherhood
March 1, 2025
"Primordial struggle. Trying to hold onto she who precedes me, he who follows. Forces beyond my control."
May 2, 2025
i did not like the diary entry format i fear. it insists upon itself
June 21, 2025
How I admire this woman and her resilience and her love
July 23, 2025
A truly stunning take on queerness that’s extremely thought provoking.
July 25, 2025
Beautiful - intimate without feeling like Moraga is giving the reader something they shouldn't have
February 27, 2026
beautiful how she weaves together her lesbian, mexican, and maternal identities. the prose is so thoughtful and it is rich with meaningful metaphors.
July 27, 2024
2.5
This drop-kicked me into a very long reading slump, but I hesitate to blame the book alone. It met all the expectations I held for the memoirs of a queer Mexican American activist, whose insights on motherhood, art, and love are undoubtedly valuable. In this particular case, I really enjoyed Moraga’s reflections on the divide between, and occasionally the merging of, a queer found family and a Mexican “blood familia”.
But with the exception of Part III: “You The Mama Now”, I just couldn’t get inspired by this text. And that’s largely a me-problem. Yet again, I grabbed a memoir on a whim and thought “this should work” (this time, considering Moraga’s wasn’t the first book I’d read on lesbian motherhood nor my first experience with Chicana feminist literature, I figured I could make a valuable exercise out of cross-referencing my reading). Against Baltasar’s fiction and Anzaldúa’s essays, however, “Waiting in the Wings” felt comparatively bland. The this is what I did today and here is a journal entry from yesterday afternoon format just doesn’t work for me (and once again, that isn’t Moraga’s fault).
Ending with a quote from the text that stood out to me:
This drop-kicked me into a very long reading slump, but I hesitate to blame the book alone. It met all the expectations I held for the memoirs of a queer Mexican American activist, whose insights on motherhood, art, and love are undoubtedly valuable. In this particular case, I really enjoyed Moraga’s reflections on the divide between, and occasionally the merging of, a queer found family and a Mexican “blood familia”.
But with the exception of Part III: “You The Mama Now”, I just couldn’t get inspired by this text. And that’s largely a me-problem. Yet again, I grabbed a memoir on a whim and thought “this should work” (this time, considering Moraga’s wasn’t the first book I’d read on lesbian motherhood nor my first experience with Chicana feminist literature, I figured I could make a valuable exercise out of cross-referencing my reading). Against Baltasar’s fiction and Anzaldúa’s essays, however, “Waiting in the Wings” felt comparatively bland. The this is what I did today and here is a journal entry from yesterday afternoon format just doesn’t work for me (and once again, that isn’t Moraga’s fault).
Ending with a quote from the text that stood out to me:
There is no denying that I had this baby that he might be a Mexican, for him to know and learn what it means for him to hold that inheritance in his body, to feel el fuego, la riqueza, la llamada de lo mexicano. And for a moment, I miss that Mexican loving in my life. I know this is the “half-breed” in me speaking; she who stands at the generational crossroad of a family. She who bears witness to the Mexican vanishing without protest into the generation that succeeds her. She who wants to not vanish as a person. As a pueblo. (Part III)
March 29, 2007
This book made me re-consider what my role as parent shall be. As a queer parent. How to forge a family of one's own in a place where the nuclear-biological one is placed on the highest pedastal.
Cherrie's prose is poetic, passionate and a powerful testament of a Chicana queer mama. The books chronicles her process of insemination, pregnancy, birth and after-birth, through journaling and addendums...what this process does to oneself, to one's partners & what one perspective on queer parenting looks like.
I can't recommend this enough. I was deeply, deeply moved by it.
Cherrie's prose is poetic, passionate and a powerful testament of a Chicana queer mama. The books chronicles her process of insemination, pregnancy, birth and after-birth, through journaling and addendums...what this process does to oneself, to one's partners & what one perspective on queer parenting looks like.
I can't recommend this enough. I was deeply, deeply moved by it.
December 30, 2014
I enjoyed the first half a lot more because I guess that I don't care about motherhood that much. So I ended up enjoying this a 3, and gave it 5 stars for quality because I do think it's a perfectly crafted piece. I just don't care for journal entries that much, and I really don't care about belief systems. I recommend the first half for sure, but the latter part...maybe if you're actually interested in motherhood.
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August 3, 2011this must be the most insightful and powerful account i have ever read of a motherhood in resistance to patriarchy and the various forces of oppression in our worlds. cherrie is an incredible and fierce writer... her voice is like no other. you really feel like you're peeking through a window in her soul.
May 24, 2014
I wanted to love this book. I really did, but it just felt flat to me. Moraga also seems to take the tack of Rebecca Walker with the conviction that there is something special about "blood relations." Maybe there is and I just don't experience it. While there are some great moments in this book, generally, I was disappointed.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews