Best Chattel Poems

Deborah Johnson, Copyright 2015

I thought de' was animals, so I didn't properly feed'em;
I'd laid down beside'em, and place my seed in,em.

 I thought de' was animals, so I'd take their black babies out the shed, and giv'em my white babies to breast feed instead.

I thought...

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Lot’s wife, Noah’s wife, John’s wife.
Who invented the internet?
Don’t say Hedy Lamarr.
Name someone else.
If it was a woman, no one will care.

Not the girls in the audience?
What girls?
You know. The other half of the population.
Good grief! We should not have even given them the vote.

Next...

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I am held in servitude 
as the chattel of love, 
I am completely subservient
to a powerful force.

I am a drudge who is obliged
to do hard work for love, 
I am determined to hold on 
to my influential master.

I will follow the order of love
that rules...

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