Woman’s Question by Frances Moore
A Sheffield teacher and activist in the National Union of Teachers, Frances Moore (1906 – 1994) was married to Bill Moore, who was a fulltime worker for the Communist Party. Although Frances’ busy life left with little time to write in her younger days, later on she produced a substantial body of poetry, some of which was published. The poem featured here raises clearly the need for women’s equality.
*
Not, comrade, as a woman
I ask for liberty,
but demand equality
as the right of a human.
It is but quibbling
to call us different
by the mere incident
of animal functioning.
Neither of us alone
can mould another life;
without the womb of wife
the shed seeds are unsown.
Neither of us alone
can mould environment
but jointly we have bent
the cosmos to our own.
Who should be integrate,
my slavery’s your disgrace,
I demand my place
shoulder to shoulder, mate.
Frances Moore
