Charlotte Perkins Gilman

“ 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
Is 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. ”

“ Men lived in hate.
For fear of criminals today
We lock the door;
Women and children still to stay
Hid evermore.
Come out! Ye need no longer hide!
What fear you now?
No wolf nor lion waits outside—
Only a cow. [6]
Come out! The world approaches peace,
War nears its end;
No warrior watches your release—
Only a friend.
Come out! The night of crime has fled—
Day is begun;
Here is no criminal to dread—
Only your son.
The world, half yours, demands your care,
Waken and come!
Make it a woman’s world; safe, fair,
Garden and home.
MOTHER TO CHILD *
How best can I serve thee, my child! ”

“ 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!
You may talk of suffrage now with an educated man,
And he agrees with all you say, as sweetly as he can:
’T would be better for us all, of course, if womanhood was free;
But “the women do not want it”—and so it must not be! [22]
’T is such a tender thoughtfulness! ”

“ “A lifted world lifts women up,”
The Socialist explained.
“You cannot lift the world at all
While half of it is kept so small,”
The Suffragist maintained.
The world awoke, and tartly spoke:
“Your work is all the same:
Work together or work apart,
Work, each of you, with all your heart—
Just get into the game!” ”

“ 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 today?
SONG FOR EQUAL SUFFRAGE †
Day of hope and day of glory! After slavery and woe,
Comes the dawn of woman’s freedom, and the light shall grow and grow
Until every man and woman equal liberty shall know,
In Freedom marching on! [23]
Woman’s right is woman’s duty! ”

“ But in the world we’re people altogether—
Suffrage is not a question of the heart.
Son—Father—Brother—Lover unsupplanted—
We’ll talk at home. This thing concerns the nation;
A point of justice which is to be granted
By men to women who are no relation.
Perceive this fact, as salient as a steeple,
Please try to argue from it if you can;
Women have standing-room on earth as people
Outside of their relation to some man. [15]
As wife and sweetheart, daughter, sister, mother,
Each woman privately her views explains;
As people of America—no other—
We claim the right our government maintains. ”

“ The miracle demands chronicling: it is all interesting. The views presented have as their raison d’être not that they are her own but that they are true. And with so much of “advanced” writing impossibly nebulous and sentimental, it is a pleasure to read matter that is clear and sane and entertaining withal. ”

“ Food and the serving of food—that is my daylong care;
What and when we shall eat, what and how we shall wear;
Soiling and cleaning of things—that is my task in the main—
Soil them and clean them and soil them—soil them and clean them again. [9]
To work at my trade by the dozen and never a trade to know ”

“ Of the pain of the world that my darling must bear—
Even so, and so only!
A QUESTION f
Why is it, God, that mother’s hearts are made
So very deep and wide?
How does it help the world that we should hold
Such welling floods of pain till we are old,
Because when we were young one grave was laid—
One baby died?
THE HOUSEWIFE f
Here is the House to hold me—cradle of all the race ”