[Sonya Renee at the Individual World Poetry Slam Finals 2006]

Culturally diversified bi-racial girl

with a small diamond nose ring and a pretty smile

poses beside the words "Women Deserve Better".

And I almost let her non-threatening grin begin to

infiltrate my psyche til I read the unlikely smallprint at the bottom of the ad:

"Sponsored by the US Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities and the Knights of Columbus"

on a bus in a city with a population of 563,000

4 teenage mothers on the bus with me.

1 Latino woman with 3 children under 3 and no signs of a daddy.

One 16 year old black girl

standing in 22 degree weather

with only a sweater and a bookbag and a basinette with an infant that aint even 4 weeks yet

tell me that yes, women do deserve better.

Women deserve better than

public transportation rhetoric from the same people who wont give that teenage mother a ride to the next transit.

Wont let you talk to their kids about safer sex.

Have never had to listen as the door slams behind the man who adamently says that shit aint his.

leaving her to wonder how she'll raise this kid.

Women deserve better than the $300 TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families] and AFDC [Aid to Families with Dependent Children ] will provide that family of 3

Or the $6 an hour job at KFC with no benefits for her new baby

or the college degree she'll never see because you cant have infants at the university.

Women deserve better than lip service paid for by politicians

who have no alternatives to abortion

though I'm sure right now one of their 17 year old daughters is sitting

in a clinic lobby sobbing quietly and anonymously

praying parents dont find out

or is waiting for mom to pick her up because

research shows that out of wedlock childbirth dont look good on political polls and Bush aint havin that.

women deserve better than patchwork governmental policies

that dont want to pay for welfare for kids

or healthcare for kids

or childcare for kids

dont want to pay living wages to working mothers

dont want to make men who only wanna be last nights lovers responsible for the semen they lay

Just flat out dont wanna pay for shit.

They want to control the woman who's having it.

Acting outraged at abortion

Well I'm outraged that they want us to believe that they believe that women deserve better

the Vatican wont prosecute pedophile priests

but I decide I'm not ready for motherhood and its condemnation for me?

These are the same people who wont support national condom distribution

to prevent teenage pregnancy

but women deserve better.

Women deserve better than back alley surgeries that leave our wombs barren and empty

deserve better than organizations bearing the name of land stealing, racist, rapists

funding million dollar campaigns on subway trains

with no money to give these women

while balding middle aged white men tell us what to do with our bodies

while they wage wars and kill other people's babies.

so maybe women deserve better than propaganda and lies to get into office.

Propaganda and lies to get into panties

to get out of court

to get out of paying child support

GET THE FUCK OUT OF OUR DECISIONS AND GIVE US BACK OUR VOICE

Women do deserve better

Women deserve choice.

[cheers]