'SHE DOGS AND TOM CATS' -- a poem by William Tell

Gloria Steinem was fond of telling her audiences that monotheism is the root of all evil in the world. Here is a song of a different vision.

                                                                                                   

Shedogs and Tomcats 

She wore the tie and gave the speech
She raised the chalice and spoke the words
She raised her skirt and emptied her womb
And called the bloody sacrifice
A declaration of her right
… against a history of oppression 
… against her very nature

He put away the sword and gun
He kept his job and cell phone
He said it didn’t matter
which flag his own he’d call 
Because he said
He’d never fight
For any flag at all

We shall never bow or genuflect
Both of them had said
For they had learned in college 
That old male God was dead

No sacred precincts of word or love
No strictures ruling from above
A serpent lurked in the suburb’s lawn
And smiled upon his latest spawn 

Then the mothers gathered their children
and covered their heads
as the old man gathered the warriors
who uncovered their swords

They chased the tomcats out of public
They lit up the filthy nests of shedogs
It was then the blood of innocents cried out
…and there was a terrible reckoning


                                     



[Shedogs: slang for a male playing a female role.
Tomcats: slang for a female playing a male role]