This is an unpublished poem, which is in a creative non-fiction book I have just about finished. Titled Taking Back Time It’s a memoir about the theory and (my) practice of Work /Life balance. I finished writing it in 2000, gave up trying to find a publisher, and put it in the ‘give up for now’ drawer. Deciding that sadly, it was still all too relevant, I decided to rescue it from the grave and update it by writing a 20 year postscript.This poem attempts to summarise 40 years of feminism in Australia!

The Slow Change Shuffle

Inching forward on tiny feet

Forward backward, side— repeat

We were impatient / after The Pill freed us / from all that breeding

that excuse for our exclusion / we expected equal treatment / Now!

to be out there in the world / out of the kitchen out of the house/ Choice!

no longer house-wife / not just teachertypistnurse / no more excuses

not to pay the same wage / to promote the same way / access to

the top jobs too / girls can do anything / EEO means CEO / of corporations

bureaucracy academia law / and of course politics! Woman’s Place is in

The House and the Senate too!

Inching forward on tiny feet

Forward backward, side— repeat

Fifty years on / starry eyes gone / and we’re shocked shitty cynical that our

brothers / do not embrace the change / with the same acclaim / Surprise!

they have had the power the privilege the money the control / Forever!

every country every culture every religion / except wicca / one of the most

persecuted of all / by man’s fear of strong women / tortured racked pilloried

burned drowned / silenced?…

The men of course / will not give up / all at once / the comfort of captive

cleaner cook cuddle-pie / keeping them in their place / which is still

in the house / definitely not The House / or in reserve / an army of labour

when free became cheap / and of course / dispensable…

But aren’t most of our lives / still better than our mothers’? though of course

some / so much more / than others’ / a few leaps in the 70’s / tiny steps and super

strides: childcare women’s studies abortion on demand / refuges ’and shelters‘/

women on the sports field /not just on the stands /male nurses female pilots drag

queens in their finery / those epi-demi-ologists / they who are non-binary

Inching forward on tiny feet

Backslide, forward, stall— repeat

Social media / double edged sword / when it’s good / spreads the word

Me-Too! / fighting back…/ then bullying sexting easy porn / children watch

children learn / domestic violence on the rise and / Surprise ! the toxic sexist

culture the media tries to feed us / now rears its ugly head / in the The House of

those who’d lead us

Until we clip the wings / of feathers we just ruffle / we are doomed forever to the

creeping Slow Change Shuffle