Beauty is Woman

Beautiful - Do I have to be?
Handsome - Can women give men a compliment without rejection?
Hot - What the Fuck?

1830 - General Association of Ministers of Massachusetts:
"When she assumes the place and tone of man... we put ourselves in self-defense against her."

1851 - Sojourner Truth:
"That man over there says that woman needs to be helped into carriages and lifted over ditches... Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles or gives me any best place. A'nt I a woman?
"Look at my arm! I have ploughed, and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And a'nt I a woman?
"I would work as much and eat as much as a man, when I could get it, and bear the lash as well. And a'nt I a woman?
"I have borne thirteen children and seen em most sold off to slavery. and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And a'nt I a woman?"

ca 1843 - Domestic Manners of the Americans
"Let me (...) describe the day of a Philadelphia lady of the first class... (...)
"She rises, and her first hour is spent in the scrupulously nice arrangement of her dress; she descends to her parlor, neat, stiff, and silent, (...) she eats her fried ham and her salt fish, and drinks her coffee in silence, while her husband reads one newspaper, and puts another under his elbow; and then perhaps she washes the cups and saucers."

1831 - Troy Female Seminary
"Mothers visiting a class at the Seminary in the early thirties were so shocked at the sight of a pupil drawing a heart, arteries and veins on a blackboard to explain the circulation of the blood, that they left the room in shame and dismay."

We've come a long way!

Today: March, 2016:

Vogue: Fashion, Beauty, Culture -
"12 daringly pretty Paris Fashion Week Looks on Taylor Hill"

Maxim (men's magazine) -
"Branson is a Master of the Universe"

Elle -
"I finally told my husband I wanted to be Dominated."

Revolution today -

Women are:

Intelligent. Confident. Independent. Strong. Proud. Gentle. Kind. Loving.

By the way, as are men!

In my childhood, no one thought to emphasize that women are brilliant! It's not just the lip-gloss that shines.

Should we revolutionize millennial tradition?

Don't get me wrong. I enjoy being told that I'm attractive. After all, I was a good student and learned well from social norms, parents, friends....

By OSL
Written for Sanctuaries, March 20, 2016

Shadows at Play

Two patterns follow me like shadows,

Attached behind, ahead, below.

And blasting light from up above,

Makes the shadow quickly grow.

The one is anger, subsided, well controlled;

Stubborn denial of the sly pristine.

The other lost and bumbling, stutters;

Making wrong lefts and playing broken tambourines.