WOMAN.
Reading edition
125
SHE WALKETH VEILED AND SLEEPING.
She walketh veiled and sleeping,
For she knoweth not her power;
She obeyeth but the pleading
Of her heart, and the high leading
Of her soul, unto this hour.
Slow advancing, halting, creeping,
Comes the Woman to the hour!—
She walketh veiled and sleeping,
For she knoweth not her power.
TO MAN.
In dark and early ages, through the primal forests faring,
Ere the soul came shining into prehistoric night,
Two-fold man was equal; they were comrades dear and daring,
Living wild and free together in unreasoning delight.
Ere the soul was born and consciousness came slowly,
Ere the soul was born, to man and woman too,
Ere he found the Tree of Knowledge, that awful tree and holy,
Ere he knew he felt, and knew he knew.
126Then said he to Pain, “I am wise now, and I know you!
No more will I suffer while power and wisdom last!”
Then said he to Pleasure, “I am strong, and I will show you
That the will of man can seize you; aye, and hold you fast!”
Food he ate for pleasure, and wine he drank for gladness,
And woman? Ah, the woman! the crown of all delight!—
His now—he knew it! He was strong to madness
In that early dawning after prehistoric night.
His—his forever! That glory sweet and tender!
Ah, but he would love her! And she should love but him!
He would work and struggle for her, he would shelter and defend her;
She should never leave him, never, till their eyes in death were dim.
Close, close he bound her, that she should leave him never;
Weak still he kept her, lest she be strong to flee;
And the fainting flame of passion he kept alive forever
With all the arts and forces of earth and sky and sea.
127And, ah, the long journey! The slow and awful ages
They have labored up together, blind and crippled, all astray!
Through what a mighty volume, with a million shameful pages,
From the freedom of the forest to the prisons of to-day!
Food he ate for pleasure, and it slew him with diseases!
Wine he drank for gladness, and it led the way to crime!
And woman? He will hold her—he will have her when he pleases—
And he never once hath seen her since the prehistoric time!
Gone the friend and comrade of the day when life was younger,
She who rests and comforts, she who helps and saves;
Still he seeks her vainly, with a never-dying hunger;
Alone beneath his tyrants, alone above his slaves!
Toiler, bent and weary with the load of thine own making!
Thou who art sad and lonely, though lonely all in vain!
128Who hast sought to conquer Pleasure and have her for the taking,
And found that Pleasure only was another name for Pain,—
Nature hath reclaimed thee, forgiving dispossession!
God hath not forgotten, though man doth still forget!
The woman-soul is rising, in despite of thy transgression;
Loose her now—and trust her! She will love thee yet!
Love thee? She will love thee as only freedom knoweth;
Love thee? She will love thee while Love itself doth live!
Fear not the heart of woman! No bitterness it showeth!
The ages of her sorrow have but taught her to forgive!
WOMEN OF TO-DAY.
You women of to-day who fear so much
The women of the future, showing how
The dangers of her course are such and such—
What are you now?
129Mothers and Wives and Housekeepers, forsooth!
Great names! you cry, full scope to rule and please!
Boom for wise age and energetic youth!—
But are you these?
Housekeepers? Do you then, like those of yore,
Keep house with power and pride, with grace and ease?
No, you keep servants only! What is more,
You don’t keep these!
Wives, say you? Wives! Blessed indeed are they
Who hold of love the everlasting keys,
Keeping their husbands’ hearts! Alas the day!
You don’t keep these!
And mothers? Pitying Heaven! Mark the cry
From cradle death-beds! Mothers on their knees!
Why, half the children born—as children die!
You don’t keep these!
And still the wailing babies come and go,
And homes are waste, and husbands’ hearts fly far,
There is no hope until you dare to know
The thing you are!
TO THE YOUNG WIFE.
Are you content, you pretty three-years’ wife?
Are you content and satisfied to live
On what your loving husband loves to give,
And give to him your life?
130Are you content with work,—to toil alone,
To clean things dirty and to soil things clean;
To be a kitchen-maid, be called a queen,—
Queen of a cook-stove throne?
Are you content to reign in that small space—
A wooden palace and a yard-fenced land—
With other queens abundant on each hand,
Each fastened in her place?
Are you content to rear your children so?
Untaught yourself, untrained, perplexed, distressed,
Are you so sure your way is always best?
That you can always know?
Have you forgotten how you used to long
In days of ardent girlhood, to be great,
To help the groaning world, to serve the state,
To be so wise—so strong?
And are you quite convinced this is the way,
The only way a woman’s duty lies—
Knowing all women so have shut their eyes?
Seeing the world to-day?
Have you no dream of life in fuller store?
Of growing to be more than that you are?
Doing the things you now do better far,
Yet doing others—more?
131Losing no love, but finding as you grew
That as you entered upon nobler life
You so became a richer, sweeter wife,
A wiser mother too?
What holds you? Ah, my dear, it is your throne,
Your paltry queenship in that narrow place,
Your antique labors, your restricted space,
Your working all alone!
Be not deceived! ’Tis not your wifely bond
That holds you, nor the mother’s royal power,
But selfish, slavish service hour by hour—
A life with no beyond!
FALSE PLAY.
“Do you love me?” asked the mother of her child,
And the baby answered, “No!”
Great Love listened and sadly smiled;
He knew the love in the heart of the child—
That you could not wake it so.
“Do not love me?” the foolish mother cried,
And the baby answered, “No!”
He knew the worth of the trick she tried—
Great Love listened, and grieving, sighed
That the mother scorned him so.
132“Oh, poor mama!” and she played her part
Till the baby’s strength gave way:
He knew it was false in his inmost heart,
But he could not bear that her tears should start,
So he joined in the lying play.
“Then love mama!” and the soft lips crept
To the kiss that his love should show,—
The mouth to speak while the spirit slept!
Great Love listened, and blushed, and wept
That they blasphemed him so.
MOTHERHOOD.
Motherhood: First mere laying of an egg,
With blind foreseeing of the wisest place,
And blind provision of the proper food
For unseen larva to grow fat upon
After the instinct-guided mother died,—
Posthumous motherhood, no love, no joy.
Motherhood: Brooding patient o’er the nest,
With gentle stirring of an unknown love;
Defending eggs unhatched, feeding the young
For days of callow feebleness, and then
Driving the fledglings from the nest to fly.
Motherhood: When the kitten and the cub
Cried out alive, and first the mother knew
133The fumbling of furry little paws,
The pressure of the hungry little mouths
Against the more than ready mother-breast,—
The love that comes of giving and of care.
Motherhood: Nursing with her heart-warm milk,
Fighting to death all danger to her young,
Hunting for food for little ones half-weaned,
Teaching them how to hunt and fight in turn,—
Then loving not till the new litter came.
Motherhood: When the little savage grew
Tall at his mother’s side, and learned to feel
Some mother even in his father’s heart,
Love coming to new babies while the first
Still needed mother’s care, and therefore love,—
Love lasting longer because childhood did.
Motherhood: Semi-civilized, intense,
Fierce with brute passion, narrow with the range
Of slavish lives to meanest service bowed;
Devoted—to the sacrifice of life;
Jealous beyond belief, and ignorant
Even of what should keep the child alive.
Love spreading with the spread of human needs,
The child’s new, changing, ever-growing wants,
Yet seeking like brute mothers of the past
To give all things to her own child herself.
Loving to the exclusion of all else;
134To the child’s service bending a whole life;
Yet stunting the young creature day by day
With lack of Justice, Liberty, and Peace.
Motherhood: Civilized. There stands at last,
Facing the heavens with as calm a smile,
The highest fruit of the long work of God;
The highest type of this, the highest race;
She from whose groping instinct grew all love—
All love—in which is all the life of man.
Motherhood: Seeing with her clear, kind eyes,
Luminous, tender eyes, wherein the smile
Is like the smile of sunlight on the sea,
That the new children of the newer day
Need more than any single heart can give,
More than is known to any single mind,
More than is found in any single house,
And need it from the day they see the light.
Then, measuring her love by what they need,
Gives, from the heart of modern motherhood.
Gives first, as tree to bear God’s highest fruit,
A clean, strong body, perfect and full grown,
Fair for the purpose of its womanhood,
Not for light fancy of a lower mind;
Gives a clear mind, athletic, beautiful,
Dispassionate, unswerving from the truth;
Gives a great heart that throbs with human love,
As she would wish her son to love the world.
135Then, when the child comes, lovely as a star,
She, in the peace of primal motherhood,
Nurses her baby with unceasing joy,
With milk of human kindness, human health,
Bright human beauty, and immortal love.
And then? Ah! here is the New Motherhood—
The motherhood of the fair new-made world—
O glorious New Mother of New Men!
Her child, with other children from its birth,
In the unstinted freedom of warm air,
Under the wisest eyes, the tenderest thought,
Surrounded by all beauty and all peace,
Led, playing, through the gardens of the world,
With the crowned heads of science and great love
Mapping safe paths for those small, rosy feet,—
Taught human love by feeling human love,
Taught justice by the laws that rule his days,
Taught wisdom by the way in which he lives,
Taught to love all mankind and serve them fair
By seeing, from his birth, all children served
With the same righteous, all-embracing care.
O Mother! Noble Mother, yet to come!
How shall thy child point to the bright career
Of her of whom he boasts to be the son—
Not for assiduous service spent on him,
But for the wisdom which has set him forth
A clear-brained, pure-souled, noble-hearted man,
136With health and strength and beauty his by birth;
And, more, for the wide record of her life,
Great work, well done, that makes him praise her name
And long to make as great a one his own!
And how shall all the children of the world,
Feeling all mothers love them, loving all,
Rise up and call her blessed!
This shall be.
SIX HOURS A DAY.
Six hours a day the woman spends on food!
Six mortal hours a day....
With fire and water toiling, heat and cold;
Struggling with laws she does not understand
Of chemistry and physics, and the weight
Of poverty and ignorance besides.
Toiling for those she loves, the added strain
Of tense emotion on her humble skill,
The sensitiveness born of love and fear,
Making it harder to do even work.
Toiling without release, no hope ahead
Of taking up another business soon,
Of varying the task she finds too hard—
This, her career, so closely interknit
With holier demands as deep as life
That to refuse to cook is held the same
137As to refuse her wife and motherhood.
Six mortal hours a day to handle food,—
Prepare it, serve it, clean it all away,—
With allied labors of the stove and tub,
The pan, the dishcloth, and the scrubbing-brush.
Developing forever in her brain
The power to do this work in which she lives;
While the slow finger of Heredity
Writes on the forehead of each living man,
Strive as he may, “His mother was a cook!”
AN OLD PROVERB.
“As much pity to see a woman weep as to see a goose go barefoot.”
No escape, little creature! The earth hath no place
For the woman who seeketh to fly from her race.
Poor, ignorant, timid, too helpless to roam,
The woman must bear what befalls her, at home.
Bear bravely, bear dumbly—it is but the same
That all others endure who live under the name.
No escape, little creature!
No escape under heaven! Can man treat you worse
After God has laid on you his infinite curse?
The heaviest burden of sorrow you win
Cannot weigh with the load of original sin;
No shame be too black for the cowering face
Of her who brought shame to the whole human race!
No escape under heaven!
138Yet you feel, being human. You shrink from the pain
That each child, born a woman, must suffer again.
From the strongest of bonds heart can feel, man can shape,
You cannot rebel, or appeal, or escape.
You must bear and endure. If the heart cannot sleep,
And the pain groweth bitter,—too bitter,—then weep!
For you feel, being human.
And she wept, being woman. The numberless years
Have counted her burdens and counted her tears;
The maid wept forsaken, the mother forlorn
For the child that was dead, and the child that was born.
Wept for joy—as a miracle!—wept in her pain!
Wept aloud, wept in secret, wept ever in vain!
Still she weeps, being woman.
REASSURANCE.
Can you imagine nothing better, brother,
Than that which you have always had before?
Have you been so content with “wife and mother,”
You dare hope nothing more?
139Have you forever prized her, praised her, sung her,
The happy queen of a most happy reign?
Never dishonored her, despised her, flung her
Derision and disdain?
Go ask the literature of all the ages!
Books that were written before women read!
Pagan and Christian, satirists and sages,—
Read what the world has said!
There was no power on earth to bid you slacken
The generous hand that painted her disgrace!
There was no shame on earth too black to blacken
That much praised woman-face!
Eve and Pandora!—always you begin it—
The ancients called her Sin and Shame and Death!
“There is no evil without woman in it,”
The modern proverb saith!
She has been yours in uttermost possession,—
Your slave, your mother, your well-chosen bride,—
And you have owned, in million-fold confession,
You were not satisfied.
Peace, then! Fear not the coming woman, brother!
Owning herself, she giveth all the more!
She shall be better woman, wife, and mother
Than man hath known before!
140
MOTHER TO CHILD.
How best can I serve thee, my child! My child!
Flesh of my flesh and dear heart of my heart!
Once thou wast within me—I held thee—I fed thee—
By the force of my loving and longing I led thee—
Now we are apart!
I may blind thee with kisses and crush with embracing,
Thy warm mouth in my neck and our arms interlacing;
But here in my body my soul lives alone,
And thou answerest me from a house of thine own,—
That house which I builded!
Which we builded together, thy father and I;
In which thou must live, O my darling, and die!
Not one stone can I alter, one atom relay,—
Not to save or defend thee or help thee to stay—
That gift is completed!
How best can I serve thee? O child, if they knew
How my heart aches with loving! How deep and how true,
How brave and enduring, how patient, how strong,
How longing for good and how fearful of wrong,
Is the love of thy mother!
141Could I crown thee with riches! Surround, overflow thee
With fame and with power till the whole world should know thee;
With wisdom and genius to hold the world still,
To bring laughter and tears, joy and pain, at thy will,
Still—thou mightst not be happy!
Such have lived—and in sorrow. The greater the mind,
The wider and deeper the grief it can find.
The richer, the gladder, the more thou canst feel
The keen stings that a lifetime is sure to reveal.
O my child! Must thou suffer?
Is there no way my life can save thine from a pain?
Is the love of a mother no possible gain?
No labor of Hercules—search for the Grail—
No way for this wonderful love to avail?
God in Heaven—O teach me!
My prayer has been answered. The pain thou must bear
Is the pain of the world’s life which thy life must share.
Thou art one with the world—though I love thee the best;
And to save thee from pain I must save all the rest—
Well—with God’s help I’ll do it!
142Thou art one with the rest. I must love thee in them.
Thou wilt sin with the rest; and thy mother must stem
The world’s sin. Thou wilt weep; and thy mother must dry
The tears of the world lest her darling should cry.
I will do it—God helping!
And I stand not alone. I will gather a band
Of all loving mothers from land unto land.
Our children are part of the world! do ye hear?
They are one with the world—we must hold them all dear!
Love all for the child’s sake!
For the sake of my child I must hasten to save
All the children on earth from the jail and the grave.
For so, and so only, I lighten the share
Of the pain of the world that my darling must bear—
Even so, and so only!
SERVICES.
She was dead. Forth went the word,
And every creature heard.
To the last hamlet in the farthest lands,
To people countless as the sands
Of primal seas.
143And with the word so sent
Her life’s full record went,—
Of what fair line, how gifted, how endowed,
How educated; and then, told aloud,
The splendid tale of what her life had done;
And all the people heard and felt as one;
Exulting all together in their dead,
And the grand story of the life she led.
But in the city where her body lay
Great services were held on that fair day:
People by thousands; music to the sky;
Flowers of a garnered season; winding by,
Processions, glorious in rich array,
All massing in the temple where she lay.
Then, when the music rested, rose and stood
Those who could speak of her and count the good,
The measureless great good her life had spread,
That all might hear the praises of their dead.
And those who loved her sent from the world’s end
Their tribute to the memory of their friend;
While teachers to their children whispered low,
“See that you have as many when you go!”
Then was recited how her life had part
In building up this science and that art,
Inventing here, administering there,
Helping to organize, create, prepare,
144With fullest figures to expatiate
On her unmeasured value to the state.
And the child, listening, grew in noble pride,
And planned for greater praises when he died.
Then the Poet spoke of those long ripening years;
And tenderer music brought the grateful tears;
And then, lest grief upon their heartstrings hang,
Her children stood around the bier and sang:
In the name of the mother that bore us—
Bore us strong—bore us free—
We will strive in the labors before us,
Even as she! Even as she!
In the name of her wisdom and beauty,
Of her life full of light,
We will live in our national duty,
We will help on the right:
We will love as her heart loved before us,
Warm and wide—strong and high!
In the name of the mother that bore us,
We will live! We will die!
IN MOTHER-TIME.
When woman looks at woman with the glory in her eyes,
When eternity lies open like a scroll,
145When immortal life is being felt,—the life that never dies,—
And the triumph of it ringeth
And the sweetness of it singeth
In the soul,
Then we come to California, the Garden of the Lord,
Through all its leagues of endless blossoming;
And we sing, we sing together, to the whole world’s deep accord—
And we feel each other praying
Over what the flowers are saying
As we sing.
We were waiting, we were growing, glad of heart and strong of soul,
Like the peace and power of all these virgin lands;
Through the years of holy maidenhood with motherhood for goal—
And soon we shall be holding
Fruit of all life’s glad unfolding
In our hands.
White-robed mothers, flower-crowned mothers, in the splendor of their youth,
In the grandeur of maturity and power;
Feeling life has passed the telling in its joyousness and truth,
146Feeling life will soon be giving
Them the golden key of living
In one hour.
We come to California for the sunshine and the flowers;
Our motherhood has brought us here as one;
For the fruit of all the ages should share the shining hours,
With the blossoms ever-springing
And the golden globes low swinging,
In the sun.
SHE WHO IS TO COME.
A woman—in so far as she beholdeth
Her one Beloved’s face;
A mother—with a great heart that enfoldeth
The children of the Race;
A body, free and strong, with that high beauty
That comes of perfect use, is built thereof;
A mind where Reason ruleth over Duty,
And Justice reigns with Love;
A self-poised, royal soul, brave, wise, and tender,
No longer blind and dumb;
A Human Being, of an unknown splendor,
Is she who is to come!
147
GIRLS OF TO-DAY.
Girls of to-day! Give ear!
Never since time began
Has come to the race of man
A year, a day, an hour,
So full of promise and power
As the time that now is here!
Never in all the lands
Was there a power so great,
To move the wheels of state,
To lift up body and mind,
To waken the deaf and blind,
As the power that is in your hands!
Here at the gates of gold
You stand in the pride of youth,
Strong in courage and truth,
Stirred by a force kept back
Through centuries long and black,
Armed with a power threefold!
First: You are makers of men!
Then Be the things you preach!
Let your own greatness teach!
When mothers like this you see
Men will be strong and free—
Then, and not till then!
148Second: Since Adam fell,
Have you not heard it said
That men by women are led?
True is the saying—true!
See to it what you do!
See that you lead them well!
Third: You have work of your own!
Maid and mother and wife,
Look in the face of life!
There are duties you owe the race!
Outside your dwelling-place
There is work for you alone!
Maid and mother and wife,
See your own work be done!
Be worthy a noble son!
Help man in the upward way!
Truly, a girl to-day
Is the strongest thing in life!
“WE, AS WOMEN.”
There’s a cry in the air about us—
We hear it before, behind—
Of the way in which “We, as women,”
Are going to lift mankind!
149With our white frocks starched and ruffled,
And our soft hair brushed and curled—
Hats off! for “we, as women,”
Are coming to help the world!
Fair sisters, listen one moment—
And perhaps you’ll pause for ten:
The business of women as women
Is only with men as men!
What we do, “we, as women,”
We have done all through our life;
The work that is ours as women
Is the work of mother and wife!
But to elevate public opinion,
And to lift up erring man,
Is the work of the Human Being;
Let us do it—if we can.
But wait, warm-hearted sisters—
Not quite so fast, so far.
Tell me how we are going to lift a thing
Any higher than we are!
We are going to “purify politics”
And to “elevate the press.”
We enter the foul paths of the world
To sweeten and cleanse and bless.
150To hear the high things we are going to do,
And the horrors of man we tell,
One would think “we, as women,” were angels,
And our brothers were fiends of hell.
We, that were born of one mother,
And reared in the selfsame place,—
In the school and the church together,—
We, of one blood, one race!
Now then, all forward together!
But remember, every one,
That it is not by feminine innocence
The work of the world is done.
The world needs strength and courage,
And wisdom to help and feed—
When “we, as women,” bring these to man,
We shall lift the world indeed!
IF MOTHER KNEW.
If mother knew the way I felt,—
And I’m sure a mother should,—
She wouldn’t make it quite so hard
For a person to be good!
I want to do the way she says;
I try to all day long;
And then she just skips all the right,
And pounces on the wrong!
151A dozen times I do a thing,
And one time I forget;
And then she looks at me and asks
If I can’t remember yet?
She’ll tell me to do something,
And I’ll really start to go;
But she’ll keep right on telling it
As if I didn’t know.
Till it seems as if I couldn’t—
It makes me kind of wild;
And then she says she never saw
Such a disobliging child.
I go to bed all sorry,
And say my prayers, and cry,
And mean next day to be so good
I just can’t wait to try.
And I get up next morning,
And mean to do just right;
But mother’s sure to scold me
About something, before night.
I wonder if she really thinks
A child could go so far,
As to be perfect all the time
As the grown up people are!
152If she only knew I tried to,—
And I’m sure a mother should,—
She wouldn’t make it quite so hard
For a person to be good!
THE ANTI-SUFFRAGISTS.
Fashionable women in luxurious homes,
With men to feed them, clothe them, pay their bills,
Bow, doff the hat, and fetch the handkerchief;
Hostess or guest, and always so supplied
With graceful deference and courtesy;
Surrounded by their servants, horses, dogs,—
These tell us they have all the rights they want.
Successful women who have won their way
Alone, with strength of their unaided arm,
Or helped by friends, or softly climbing up
By the sweet aid of “woman’s influence;”
Successful any way, and caring naught
For any other woman’s unsuccess,—
These tell us they have all the rights they want.
Religious women of the feebler sort,—
Not the religion of a righteous world,
A free, enlightened, upward-reaching world,
But the religion that considers life
As something to back out of!—whose ideal
153Is to renounce, submit, and sacrifice,
Counting on being patted on the head
And given a high chair when they get to heaven,—
These tell us they have all the rights they want.
Ignorant women—college-bred sometimes,
But ignorant of life’s realities
And principles of righteous government,
And how the privileges they enjoy
Were won with blood and tears by those before—
Those they condemn, whose ways they now oppose;
Saying, “Why not let well enough alone?
Our world is very pleasant as it is,”—
These tell us they have all the rights they want.
And selfish women,—pigs in petticoats,—
Rich, poor, wise, unwise, top or bottom round,
But all sublimely innocent of thought,
And guiltless of ambition, save the one
Deep, voiceless aspiration—to be fed!
These have no use for rights or duties more.
Duties to-day are more than they can meet,
And law insures their right to clothes and food,—
These tell us they have all the rights they want.
And, more’s the pity, some good women, too;
Good conscientious women, with ideas;
Who think—or think they think—that woman’s cause
154Is best advanced by letting it alone;
That she somehow is not a human thing,
And not to be helped on by human means,
Just added to humanity—an “L”—
A wing, a branch, an extra, not mankind,—
These tell us they have all the rights they want.
And out of these has come a monstrous thing,
A strange, down-sucking whirlpool of disgrace,
Women uniting against womanhood,
And using that great name to hide their sin!
Vain are their words as that old king’s command
Who set his will against the rising tide.
But who shall measure the historic shame
Of these poor traitors—traitors are they all—
To great Democracy and Womanhood!
WOMEN DO NOT WANT IT.
When the woman suffrage argument first stood upon its legs,
They answered it with cabbages, they answered it with eggs,
They answered it with ridicule, they answered it with scorn,
They thought it a monstrosity that should not have been born.
155When the woman suffrage argument grew vigorous and wise,
And was not to be silenced by these apposite replies,
They turned their opposition into reasoning severe
Upon the limitations of our God-appointed sphere.
We were told of disabilities,—a long array of these,
Till one would think that womanhood was merely a disease;
And “the maternal sacrifice” was added to the plan
Of the various sacrifices we have always made—to man.
Religionists and scientists, in amity and bliss,
However else they disagreed, could all agree on this,
And the gist of all their discourse, when you got down to it,
Was—we could not have the ballot because we were not fit!
They would not hear to reason, they would not fairly yield,
They would not own their arguments were beaten in the field;
But time passed on, and someway, we need not ask them how,
Whatever ails those arguments—we do not hear them now!
156You may talk of woman suffrage now with an educated man,
And he agrees with all you say, as sweetly as he can;
’Twould be better for us all, of course, if womanhood was free;
But “the women do not want it”—and so it must not be!
’Tis such a tender thoughtfulness! So exquisite a care!
Not to pile on our fair shoulders what we do not wish to bear!
But, oh, most generous brother! Let us look a little more—
Have we women always wanted what you gave to us before?
Did we ask for veils and harems in the Oriental races?
Did we beseech to be “unclean,” shut out of sacred places?
Did we beg for scolding bridles and ducking stools to come?
And clamor for the beating stick no thicker than your thumb?
157Did we seek to be forbidden from all the trades that pay?
Did we claim the lower wages for a man’s full work to-day?
Have we petitioned for the laws wherein our shame is shown:
That not a woman’s child—nor her own body—is her own?
What women want has never been a strongly acting cause
When woman has been wronged by man in churches, customs, laws;
Why should he find this preference so largely in his way
When he himself admits the right of what we ask to-day?
WEDDED BLISS.
“O come and be my mate!” said the Eagle to the Hen;
“I love to soar, but then
I want my mate to rest
Forever in the nest!”
Said the Hen, “I cannot fly,
I have no wish to try,
But I joy to see my mate careering through the sky!”
They wed, and cried, “Ah, this is Love, my own!”
And the Hen sat, the Eagle soared, alone.
158“O come and be my mate!” said the Lion to the Sheep;
“My love for you is deep!
I slay, a Lion should,
But you are mild and good!”
Said the Sheep, “I do no ill—
Could not, had I the will—
But I joy to see my mate pursue, devour, and kill.”
They wed, and cried, “Ah, this is Love, my own!”
And the Sheep browsed, the Lion prowled, alone.
“O come and be my mate!” said the Salmon to the Clam;
“You are not wise, but I am.
I know sea and stream as well;
You know nothing but your shell.”
Said the Clam, “I’m slow of motion,
But my love is all devotion,
And I joy to have my mate traverse lake and stream and ocean!”
They wed, and cried, “Ah, this is Love, my own!”
And the Clam sucked, the Salmon swam, alone.
THE HOLY STOVE.
O the soap-vat is a common thing!
The pickle-tub is low!
The loom and wheel have lost their grace
159In falling from the dwelling-place
To mills where all may go!
The bread-tray needeth not your love;
The wash-tub wide doth roam;
Even the oven free may rove;
But bow ye down to the Holy Stove,
The Altar of the Home!
Before it bend the worshippers,
And wreaths of parsley twine;
Above it still the incense curls,
And a passing train of hired girls
Do service at the shrine.
We toil to keep the altar crowned
With dishes new and nice,
And Art and Love, and Time and Truth,
We offer up, with Health and Youth,
In daily sacrifice.
Speak not to us of a fairer faith,
Of a lifetime free from pain.
Our fathers always worshipped here,
Our mothers served this altar drear,
And still we serve amain.
Our earliest dreams around it cling,
Bright hopes that childhood sees,
And memory leaves a vista wide
Where Mother’s Doughnuts rank beside
The thought of Mother’s Knees.
160The wood-box hath no sanctity;
No glamour gilds the coal;
But the Cook-Stove is a sacred thing
To which a reverent faith we bring
And serve with heart and soul.
The Home’s a temple all divine,
By the Poker and the Hod!
The Holy Stove is the altar fine,
The wife the priestess at the shrine—
Now who can be the god?
THE MOTHER’S CHARGE.
She raised her head. With hot and glittering eye,
“I know,” she said, “that I am going to die.
Come here, my daughter, while my mind is clear.
Let me make plain to you your duty here;
My duty once—I never failed to try—
But for some reason I am going to die.”
She raised her head, and, while her eyes rolled wild,
Poured these instructions on the gasping child:
“Begin at once—don’t iron sitting down—
Wash your potatoes when the fat is brown—
Monday, unless it rains—it always pays
To get fall sewing done on the right days—
A carpet-sweeper and a little broom—
Save dishes—wash the summer dining-room
161With soda—keep the children out of doors—
The starch is out—beeswax on all the floors—
If girls are treated like your friends they stay—
They stay, and treat you like their friends—the way
To make home happy is to keep a jar—
And save the prettiest pieces for the star
In the middle—blue’s too dark—all silk is best—
And don’t forget the corners—when they’re dressed
Put them on ice—and always wash the chest
Three times a day, the windows every week—
We need more flour—the bedroom ceilings leak—
It’s better than onion—keep the boys at home—
Gardening is good—a load, three loads of loam—
They bloom in spring—and smile, smile always, dear—
Be brave, keep on—I hope I’ve made it clear.”
She died, as all her mothers died before.
Her daughter died in turn, and made one more.
A BROOD MARE.
It is a significant fact that the phenomenal improvement in horses during recent years is accompanied by the growing conviction that good points and a good record are as desirable in the dam as in the sire, if not more so.
I had a quarrel yesterday,
A violent dispute,
With a man who tried to sell to me
A strange amorphous brute;
162A creature disproportionate,
A beast to make you stare,
An undeveloped, overgrown,
Outrageous-looking mare.
Her fore legs they were weak and thin,
Her hind legs weak and fat;
She was heavy in the quarters,
With a narrow chest and flat;
And she had managed to combine—
I’m sure I don’t know how—
The barrel of a greyhound
With the belly of a cow.
She seemed exceeding feeble,
And he owned with manner bland
That she walked a little, easily,
But wasn’t fit to stand.
I tried to mount the animal
To test her on the track;
But he cried in real anxiety,
“Get off! You’ll strain her back!”
And then I sought to harness her,
But he explained at length
That any draught or carriage work
Was quite beyond her strength.
163“No use to carry or to pull!
No use upon the course!”
Said I, “How can you have the face
To call that thing a horse?”
Said he, indignantly, “I don’t!
I’m dealing on the square;
I never said it was a horse,
I told you ’twas a mare!
“A mare was never meant to race,
To carry, or to pull;
She is meant for breeding only, so
Her place in life is full.”
Said I, “Do you pretend to breed
From such a beast as that?
A mass of shapeless skin and bone,
Or shapeless skin and fat?”
Said he, “Her sire was thoroughbred,
As fine as walked the earth,
And all her colts receive from him
The marks of noble birth;
“And then I mate her carefully
With horses fine and fit;
Mares do not need to have themselves
The points which they transmit!”
164Said I, “Do you pretend to say
You can raise colts as fair
From that fat cripple as you can
From an able-bodied mare?”
Quoth he, “I solemnly assert,
Just as I said before,
A mare that’s good for breeding
Can be good for nothing more!”
Cried I, “One thing is certain proof;
One thing I want to see;
Trot out the noble colts you raise
From your anomaly.”
He looked a little dashed at this,
And the poor mare hung her head.
“Fact is,” said he, “she’s had but one,
And that one—well, it’s dead!”
FEMININE VANITY.
Feminine Vanity! O ye Gods! Hear to this man!
As if silk and velvet and feathers and fur
And jewels and gold had been just for her,
Since the world began!
Where is his memory? Let him look back—all of the way!
Let him study the history of his race
From the first he-savage that painted his face
To the dude of to-day!
165Vanity! Oh! Are the twists and curls,
The intricate patterns in red, black, and blue,
The wearisome tortures of rich tattoo,
Just made for girls?
Is it only the squaw who files the teeth,
And dangles the lip, and bores the ear,
And wears bracelet and necklet and anklet as queer
As the bones beneath?
Look at the soldier, the noble, the king!
Egypt or Greece or Rome discloses
The purples and perfumes and gems and roses
On a masculine thing!
Look at the men of our own dark ages!
Heroes too, in their cloth of gold,
With jewels as thick as the cloth could hold,
On the knights and pages!
We wear false hair? Our man looks big!
But it’s not so long, let me beg to state,
Since every gentleman shaved his pate
And wore a wig.
French heels? Sharp toes? See our feet defaced?
But there was a day when the soldier free
Tied the toe of his shoe to the manly knee—
Yes, and even his waist!
166We pad and stuff? Our man looks bolder.
Don’t speak of the time when a bran-filled bunch
Made an English gentleman look like Punch—
But feel of his shoulder!
Feminine Vanity! O ye Gods! Hear to these men!
Vanity’s wide as the world is wide!
Look at the peacock in his pride—
Is it a hen?
THE MODEST MAID.
I am a modest San Francisco maid,
Fresh, fair, and young,
Such as the painters gladly have displayed,
The poets sung.
Modest?—Oh, modest as a bud unblown,
A thought unspoken;
Hidden and cherished, unbeheld, unknown,
In peace unbroken.
Far from the holy shades of this my home,
The coarse world raves,
And the New Woman cries to heaven’s dome
For what she craves.
Loud, vulgar, public, screaming from the stage,
Her skirt divided,
Riding cross-saddled on the dying age,
Justly derided.
167I blush for her, I blush for our sweet sex
By her disgraced.
My sphere is home. My soul I do not vex
With zeal misplaced.
Come then to me with happy heart, O man!
I wait your visit.
To guide your footsteps I do all I can,
Am most explicit.
As veined flower-petals teach the passing bee
The way to honey,
So printer’s ink displayed instructeth thee
Where lies my money.
Go see! In type and cut across the page,
Before the nation,
There you may read about my eyes, my age,
My education,
My fluffy golden hair, my tiny feet,
My pet ambition,
My well-developed figure, and my sweet,
Retiring disposition.
All, all is there, and now I coyly wait.
Pray don’t delay.
My address does the Blue Book plainly state,
And mamma’s “day.”
San Francisco, 1895.
168
UNSEXED.
It was a wild rebellious drone
That loudly did complain;
He wished he was a worker bee
With all his might and main.
“I want to work,” the drone declared.
Quoth they, “The thing you mean
Is that you scorn to be a drone
And long to be a queen.
“You long to lay unnumbered eggs,
And rule the waiting throng;
You long to lead our summer flight,
And this is rankly wrong.”
Cried he, “My life is pitiful!
I only eat and wed,
And in my marriage is the end—
Thereafter I am dead.
“I would I were the busy bee
That flits from flower to flower;
I long to share in work and care
And feel the worker’s power.”
Quoth they, “The life you dare to spurn
Is set before you here
As your one great, prescribed, ordained,
Divinely ordered sphere!
169“Without your, services as drone,
We should not be alive;
Your modest task, when well fulfilled,
Preserves the busy hive.
“Why underrate your blessed power?
Why leave your rightful throne
To choose a field of life that’s made
For working bees alone?”
Cried he, “But it is not enough,
My momentary task!
Let me do that and more beside:
To work is all I ask!”
Then fiercely rose the workers all,
For sorely were they vexed;
“O wretch!” they cried, “should this betide,
You would become unsexed!”
And yet he had not sighed for eggs,
Nor yet for royal mien;
He longed to be a worker bee,
But not to be a queen.
FEMALES.
The female fox she is a fox;
The female whale a whale;
The female eagle holds her place
As representative of race
As truly as the male.
170The mother hen doth scratch for her chicks,
And scratch for herself beside;
The mother cow doth nurse her calf,
Yet fares as well as her other half
In the pasture free and wide.
The female bird doth soar in air;
The female fish doth swim;
The fleet-foot mare upon the course
Doth hold her own with the flying horse—
Yea, and she beateth him!
One female in the world we find
Telling a different tale.
It is the female of our race,
Who holds a parasitic place
Dependent on the male.
Not so, saith she, ye slander me!
No parasite am I!
I earn my living as a wife;
My children take my very life.
Why should I share in human strife.
To plant and build and buy?
The human race holds highest place
In all the world so wide,
Yet these inferior females wive,
And raise their little ones alive,
And feed themselves beside.
171The race is higher than the sex,
Though sex be fair and good;
A Human Creature is your state,
And to be human is more great
Than even womanhood!
The female fox she is a fox;
The female whale a whale;
The female eagle holds her place
As representative of race
As truly as the male.
A MOTHER’S SOLILOQUY.
You soft, pink, moving thing!
Young limbs that crave
Motion as free as zephyr-lifted wave;
Uneasy with the push of unlearned powers!
Exploring slowly through half-conscious hours;
With what rich new surprise and joy you feel
Your own will move yourself from head to heel!
So, let me swaddle you in bandage tight,
Dress you in wide, confining folds of white,
Cover you warmly, hold you close, and so
A mother’s instinct-guided love I’ll show!
Mysterious little frame!
Each organ new
And learning swiftly what it has to do!
172Thy life’s bright stream—as yet so newly thine—
Refreshed by heaven’s sunlit air divine;
With what delight you breathe in rosy ease
The strengthening, restful, blossom-scented breeze!
So, let me wrap you in a blanket shawl,
And veil your face in woollen, when at all
You meet the air. Here in my arms is best
The curtained bedroom where your elders rest;
So shall I guard you from a draught, and so
A mother’s instinct-guided love I’ll show.
Young earnest mind at work!
Each sense attends
To teach you life’s approaching foes and friends;
Eye, ear, nose, tongue, and ever ready hand,
Eager to help you learn and understand.
What floods of happiness the day insures,
While each new knowledge is becoming yours!
So, let me firmly take away from you
The things you so persistently would view;
And when you stretch the hand that tells so much,
Rap your soft knuckles and exclaim, “Don’t touch!”
I’ll tell you what you ought to learn, and so,
A mother’s instinct-guided love I’ll show.
An ordinary child at best,
So neighbors tell;
Not very large and strong, not very well;
173A victim to the measles and the croup,
Fevers that flush and chill, and coughs that whoop;
To unknown naughtiness and well-known pain;
No racial progress here—no special gain!
But I, your mother, see with other eyes;
I hold you second to none under skies,
This estimate, unbased on any fact,
Shall teach you how to feel and how to act,
Shall make you wise, and true, and strong, and so,
A mother’s instinct-guided love I’ll show.
THEY WANDERED FORTH.
They wandered forth in springtime woods,
Three women, thickly hung
With yards and yards of woollen goods—
To play that they were young!
The river raced with the racing air;
The woods were wild with song;
The glad birds darted everywhere—
And so they walked along!
Stiff-bodied, fat, oppressed with cloth,
Dull-colored, sad to see,
Slow-moving over the bright grass,
Their shapeless shadows fall and pass,
And dreaming not—alas! alas!
Of what dear life might be!
174
BABY LOVE.
Baby Love came prancing by,
Cap on head and sword on thigh,
Horse to ride and drum to beat,—
All the world beneath his feet.
Mother Life was sitting there,
Hard at work and full of care,
Set of mouth and sad of eye.
Baby Love came prancing by.
Baby Love was very proud,
Very lively, very loud;
Mother Life arose in wrath,
Set an arm across his path.
Baby Love wept loud and long,
But his mother’s arm was strong.
Mother had to work, she said.
Baby Love was put to bed.
175