Not a Thing to Own

Dear readers as I write this tonight I don’t know if I am going to be evicted illegally from my temporary accommodation. I don’t want to be forced back into rough sleeping. I have short term, medium term and long-term plans but they are nothing but pipe dreams without a permanent home. I wish those who control my life realised I’m not a thing to own.

Problem is when you’ve spent a lifetime living below the “glass floor” you are conditioned to understand, know on a fundamental, almost genetic level, that others own you.

BIGGEST PROBLEM

The biggest problem though, and it breaks my heart that some of my readers already know, is that there’s millions of us bellow the glass floor. It’s mainly women and girls down here but there are a significant number of boys and men here as well.

Not a Thing to Own

I am not a thing to own
To leave in the rain
Silent in my pain
I’m your little girl

I am not a thing to own
While you watch TV
The adults text me
I’m your teenage girl

I am not a thing to own
With kids by myself
My life left on the shelf
I’m the woman you said you loved

I’m not you ticket to freedom
Your free ride to heaven
I’m the lass you ripped
From her family and home

I am not a thing to own
Sir you got any change
The plastic keeps out the rain
I’m the lady you trafficked

I am not a thing to own
Make up hides bruises
I still dance to the music
I’m the lady you played

I am not a thing to own
Wasting away in a home
While you chat on the phone
I’m the lady who gave you life

We are not your things to own
Not shields for their guns
We hate life on the run
We are half the human race

Let us show are faces with pride
Help us hold our heads up high
We’ve hands ready to care
Faced danger quelled the angry beasts in your breasts
And still you say that you own us
Like a piece of meat

We’re no longer falling at your feet
But together we’ll all stand with pride
We can teach you to care
We will show you I swear
How the glass floor damages your heart
Ripping society apart at the seams.

Not Our Fault

Readers, I hope that my poem allowed you some tears of relief. I have to admit that I had tears of both anger, pain and relief. You know readers I speak from personal experience. I hope you’ve never slept with slaves but you are likely to of seen some. No? Let me clear the mist from your eyes.

Have you ever seen a figure, wrapped in plastic, shivering in the cold, sitting on the pavement holding a cup? Look closely at their eyes. Do you see fear, desperation, a look of sadness so deep you feel your going to drown? Do they speak your language? You sure you’ve never met a slave?

How about that dodgy area in town. You know the one you don’t go near at night. Do you see that lady, dressed up to the nines leaning into the car window? Do you wonder why she’s shivering in the cold? Do you ask yourself if it’s her friends in the car as it drives off leaving her just standing there? Do you think she is happy in the dark dirty street? You sure you’ve never seen a slave?

What about that lady with a flock of kids hanging to her legs. You know the one pushing a pushchair wearing sunglasses and long sleeves. Do you judge the scruffy clothes on the children? Perhaps you think that she is not fit to have so many offspring. Look at the children, do you see fear? Or that tough hard edge that comes from being forced to learn to survive, judging how drunk daddy is? You really think it’s her choice?

The Glass Floor

I want to thank the late Stieg Larsson for standing up for women in his work The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. It’s Stieg’s book that this statistical photo is taken from. The female hero lives below the Glass Floor like me. For the likes of us even just reaching Glass Ceiling level seems like a delusional impossibility.

The Glass Floor is made of the same discriminatory substance as the Glass Ceiling that stops capable woman, those with wrong colour skin, wrong religion from reaching the company board rooms. The thing is the Glass Floor prevents us from reaching even the first rung of the corporate ladder.

Please think about that next time you go into town and see someone who doesn’t look or feel OK.