This is a poem I wrote, I am turning into a song. I spent the weekend in Windber, at the Grand Midway Hotel with Blair and Renee. There they told me a story of Becky, a young woman hung as a witch in the mid 1800's and buried in an unmarked grave in Snavley's cemetery. We went to the graveyard and it was overgrown, many kicked over headstones and some so worn down you could not read them , and we were of course, unable to locate the grave site of Becky. Becky's crime was studying herbology and the culture of the local Native Americans who once lived in central PA. She is guilty of such crimes of learning that ecchineacea and golden seal are good for the immune system and help to detoxify bodies and that raspberry leaf tea helps an overdue pregnant woman give birth. So, here is a poem I wrote, my voice teacher thinks it is distressingly applicable to the political climate we have today with the threat of Sara Pailn looming ahead, like a some horrific specter of puritanical death:
(image on right taken from flickr account : Freeparking and has a Creative Commons license)
"Hey pretty Becky with your long hair down,
Why do you hang around this small town?
You studied with the women, who heard stories from the land,
The whispering in the silence, ancestor spirits guiding man.
You learned which plants would heal us, you sang the chants and prayed,
Helped to birth the babies live and keep disease at bay.
You learned many secret things to find and share,
With the people of this town who just can't bear,
To see the ways of others, they think it's Satan's hand,
They'll kill you just to stop you, Your gifts scorned by the ropes of man.
So we sing of pretty Becky, she hangs with her long hair down,
Strangled but not voiceless, her story sung with my voice renowned.
We say, Beware! All ye young women, who study secrets far and wide!
Beware the small minds of men, for they may call you, Satan's bride. "
by Phat Man Dee , copyright 2008
Do not reprint or repost without written permission of the author
With that in mind, this is an email I sent to <womensaynopalin@gmail.com>">
I, as a woman living in America swear that I will ask for political asylum in another country if this bible thumping nut ends up helping to run the country. As a woman she offends me on a
cellular level. How dare she think she may lead our present and future generations on the teat of intolerance and sheer ignorance?
Our mothers and grandmothers fought and paid dearly, some with their lives, to defend the God and Goddess given rights of woman to exist equal to man. We are human and have the right to determine our own life paths. We are human and have the right to study what religion we deem best for ourselves and our family. I do not want need some over zealous theocratic self hating female shaped puppet telling me or my family what to do, think or say. If she ends up being Vice President than we may need to prepare for another couple hundred years of witch burning.... girls get your corsets and your wire hangers!!!!
Phat Man Dee
Why, Mandee, why may I ask did you scribe such a letter??? Well, I'll tell you. I am worried about the future of our nation. I pray every day that Barack Obama wins the election. I am horrified at the statements and actions of McCain and now his helpmeet in horror, Palin. I think they are 2 of the horsemen of the apocalypse and must be stopped at all costs. This is a letter I received from my voice teacher:
>Friends, compatriots, fellow-lamenters,
>> We are writing to you because of the fury and dread we have
> felt since the
> announcement of Sarah Palin as the Vice-Presidential
> candidate for the
> Republican Party. We believe that this terrible decision
> has surpassed mere
> partisanship, and that it is a dangerous farce—on the
> part of a pandering
> and rudderless Presidential candidate—that has a real
> possibility of
> becoming fact.
>
> Perhaps like us, as American women, you share the fear of
> what Ms. Palin and
> her professed beliefs and proven record could lead to for
> ourselves and for
> our present or future daughters. To date, she is against
> sex education,
> birth control, the pro-choice platform, environmental
> protection,
> alternative energy development, freedom of speech (as mayor
> she wanted to
> ban books and attempted to fire the librarian who stood
> against her), gun
> control, the separation of church and state, and polar
> bears. To say nothing
> of her complete lack of real preparation to become the
> second-most-powerful
> person on the planet.
> We want to clarify that we are not against Sarah Palin as a
> woman, a mother,
> or, for that matter, a parent of a pregnant teenager, but
> solely as a rash,
> incompetent, and all together devastating choice for Vice
> President. Ms.
> Palin's political views are in every way a slap in the
> face to the
> accomplishments that our mothers and grandmothers and
> great-grandmothers so
> fiercely fought for, and that we've so demonstrably
> benefited from.
>
> *First and foremost, Ms. Palin does not represent us. She
> does not
> demonstrate or uphold our interests as American women. It
> is presumed that
> the inclusion of a woman on the Republican ticket could win
> over women
> voters. We want to disagree, publicly.*
>
> *Therefore, we invite you to reply here
> <womensaynopalin@gmail.com> with a
> short, succinct message about why you, as a woman living in
> this country, do
> not support this candidate as second-in-command for our
> nation.*
>
> Please include your name (last initial is fine), age, and
> place of
> residence.
>
> We will post your responses on a blog called "Women
> Against Sarah Palin,"
> which we intend to publicize as widely as possible. Please
> send us your
> reply at your earliest convenience—the greater the volume
> of responses we
> receive, the stronger our message will be.
>
> Thank you for your time and action.
>
> *VIVA!*
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Quinn Latimer and Lyra Kilston
> New York, NY
> womensaynopalin@gmail.com
>
> ***PLEASE FORWARD WIDELY!* If you send this to 20 women in
> the next hour,
> you could be blessed with a country that takes your
> concerns seriously.
> Stranger things have happened.
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