Women’s heroes are everyone’s heroes! In celebration of the 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment giving women the right to vote, we read books that are by, for, and about powerful women of all ages. A pre-teen who helped discover the world’s first dinosaur bone, a young women in the early 20th century who braved the illness and death of the radium factories and fought a groundbreaking battle for workers’ rights, or teens—one black, one white—who rely on each other to survive a night of violent race riots in their city—these are the stories of remarkable women of history and resourceful everyday girls. Did you know that much of the fight for women’s voting rights was written and shouted and promoted through poems written (and published!) by the activists in the Women’s Suffrage Movement? It’s true! Some poetry ended up in published collections, while others were printed in newspapers or pamphlets to get the word out. Today, we’re sharing a bunch of really rad poetry from the Suffrage Movement to get you amped up and ready to take on the world.
Poetry From the Suffrage Movement
If you need more feminism in your life, please enjoy these books about early American feminists and literary activists of the Women’s Suffrage Movement. Here’s one beautiful verse from her poem “Songs for the People,” which can be found in this collection: Our world, so worn and weary, Needs music, pure and strong,To hush the jangle and discords Of sorrow, pain, and wrong. Included in this collection is the stunning “Song for Equal Suffrage,” with this perfect stanza: Woman’s right is woman’s duty! For our share in life we call!Our will it is not weakened and our power it is not small.We are half of every nation! We are mothers of them all! In Wisdom marching on! Here is an expert from another of her great satirical poems, “What Governments Say to Women”: In Time of PeaceWhat’s this? You’ve wed an alien, Yet you ask for legislationTo guard your nationality? We’re shocked at your demand.A woman when she marries Takes her husband’s name and nation:She should love her husband only. What’s a woman’s native land? I sit and sew—a useless task it seems,My hands grown tired, my head weighed down with dreams—The panoply of war, the martial tred of men,Grim-faced, stern-eyed, gazing beyond the kenOf lesser souls, whose eyes have not seen DeathNor learned to hold their lives but as a breath—But—I must sit and sew. There was a little girl and she had a little curl Right down the middle of her forehead.When she got the vote she was very good, indeed, But when they kept it from her she was horrid. Let us in through the guarded gate,Let us in for our pain’s sake!Lips set smiling and face made fairStill for you through the pain we bare,We have hid till our hearts were soreBlacker things than you ever bore:Let us in through the guarded gate,Let us in for our pain’s sake! Let us in through the guarded gate,Let us in for our strength’s sake!Light held high in a strife ne’er throughWe have fought for our sons and you,We have conquered a million years’Pain and evil and doubt and tears—Let us in through the guarded gate,Let us in for our strength’s sake!
