Maybe deep down I believe
human beings will be pretty
much the same everywhere, but then
I figure women are the more.
The things we share,
the dustcloth, the tablecloth, the clothesline,
the shopping list, the marinade, the stove,
the basin, we cook our pans and rinse’em,
our errands, our bags, our eggs.
Surely they, for the most part,
shave their chins and love
the outdoors, but they are doctors,
farm men, stockmen, stockbrokers and the
whole gamut, we are
all house-tight, and
still don’t seem to agree, writing
this will do no good, narrow-minded
border etching, dualistic bullshit,
and poetry is descended from angels
who we all know are sexless.
Fine. Why do I bother,
I do my stuff and love my man,
have nothing nasty to complain,
he feeds my hunger so why
do I snarl? It’s not my shoes
I feel tight in, it’s your tarpaulins,
your high-heels, resentful women
I take in.
Your witty snippets, cracking the dishes,
your lipstick anger, your breasts
ajar, at the coffee-table
poisoning the air.
But when I talk of prejudice inherited,
of founding fathers, of floundering mothers,
you rage, you snap,
O for christ’s sake ya full of crap
what gives you the right to patronize?
I pay my bill, I rise, I pack, away
we break,
it was
my mistake.