Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Honoring Woman/Women's Achievements

Still-Life with Bouquet of Flowers and Plums
by Rachel Ruysch (1664–1750) 

“For most of history, Anonymous was a woman.” 
― Virginia Woolf

And if it means so little to you that you can just give it away, hand it to him, then why should it mean any more to him? He can't value you more than you value yourself.” 
― Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon

Midweek Motif ~ Honoring 

Woman/Women's Achievements

Saturday, March 8th is International Woman's Day.
Is gender equality an issue in your life?  

How have you been influenced by a woman or women?  

(This is an opportunity to write of a specific woman.) 

This week I am inspired by women in my life: Mom, Grandmother, aunts, cousins, friends, teachers, students, actors, directors, journalists, novelists, playwrights, and poets. Also Marie Curie, Harriet Tubman, Sonja Heni, Sojourner Truth, Marian Anderson, Amelia Earhart, Gloria Steinem, Rosa Parks, Maria in West Side Story, Mary Poppins, Queen Elizabeth I, Golda Meir, Indira Gandhi, Lily Tomlin, Katharine Hepburn, Ellen Stewart, Elizabeth Swados, Joni Mitchell, Meg Christian, Laurie Anderson, Oprah Winfrey, Helen Caldicott, Hilary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Eleanor Roosevelt, Simone de Beauvoir and many many others including poets among YOU.  

Here's one by the American Dorothy Parker who delighted to shock her world:

                    Indian Summer 

“In youth, it was a way I had,  

To do my best to please.

And change, with every passing lad

To suit his theories.

But now I know the things I know

And do the things I do,

And if you do not like me so,

To hell, my love, with you.”              

                               ― The Complete Poems of Dorothy Parker

A global hub for sharing International Women's Day news, events and resources

(Our next Midweek Motif will be "The Ides of March" or Prescience)

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Poets United Mid-Week Motif ~ Equality

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. 
Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”

Martin Luther King, Jr.,  Memorial National Memorial

A MOTIF is an important and usually repeating idea or theme in a work of art, a feature 
in a decoration or design <a flower motif in wallpaper>, and similar ideas in music and science.

Today’s Motif:  Equality

Write a narrative poem relating an experience that illustrates equality or inequality.  Some of us will show an event ruled by hatred and/or racial oppression ~ a story we have been reluctant to tell.  It may be as "small" as wishing we said a joke "isn't funny" to as large as turning a country around. Others may recall or imagine an event ruled by such equality that it is almost invisible. Feel free to take an historical subject if you wish. 

Today, January 15th, is the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Like Nelson Mandela in South Africa, MLK worked in the USA for a non-violent solution to the isolation and oppression of Black citizens.  His goal was huge: to heal the racial divide in the USA by guaranteeing to all citizens equal rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

In the comments below, please say what inspires you when you think about equal rights ~ a song, poem, story, artwork, event or person?  Here's one of my inspirations, a poem by Countee Cullen:

Tableau 

Locked arm in arm they cross the way
The black boy and the white,
The golden splendor of the day
The sable pride of night.

From lowered blinds the dark folk stare
And here the fair folk talk,
Indignant that these two should dare
In unison to walk.

Oblivious to look and word
They pass, and see no wonder
That lightning brilliant as a sword
Should blaze the path of thunder. 

And another, the first song about equal rights I ever heard:

Please:

1.     Post your narrative poem on your site and then link it here.

2.     Share only original and new work written for this challenge. 

3.     Honor our community by visiting and commenting on others' poems.

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