Be Bold For Change - International Women's Day Theme. Poem by Bernedita Rosinha Pinto

At the polo game
on the horse's back
they sit upright and play;
at the equestrian
they jump those hurdles
with ease and gait
so proud they feel to win;
they are teachers at school
they are bartenders and waitresses
they are driving buses and taxis
they are the women of today
yesterdays kept them milking cows
cooking broth and soups
farming cabbages and potatoes
while their husbands ploughed the fields;
but today they work as
policemen, judges, lawyers
they are in the army and in the navy
they are pilots and astronauts
they are scientists and doctors;
the change was invented by just one factor
called equality
and though they were mothers.
neither marriage or child bearing
ever stopped them from expecting
what they wanted to be or do
and nothing could stop them from doing
what they could do to better their lives
whether they had to face gender bias
or neglect for being a girl-child;
all they wanted was to be independent
all they sought was respect
for what they could do
and not for what they were,
they wanted men to know
that they were the sons
born within their wombs
and as they grew
they must not forget
the nurturing, the effort
to make them strong in health
and wise in minds
was that mother
who was a woman herself.
be bold for a change
be bold and remind them
out of a woman is born that man
just as out of an apple tree comes an apple
the fruit that the tree yields
is known by the tree first
so does a man need a tree called woman
to display his identity
to hold his roots, his branches, his leaves,
his courage, his dignity
which by equality he must respond and return
perennially, mutually, respectfully
to gain a reverence, a connection
so unbreakable, so certain
that no difference or discrimination rattles
to wake up the sleeping mother
from her slumber where she is remembering
that son, that daughter
who stands there on the podium to receive
those gold medals, those Oscars, those awards
were the children of a woman called mother.