Haikus With My Daughter III: Girls Rights

On By Jennifer PrestholdtIn Culture, Family, Girls Rights, Memoir, Parenting, Poetry, Weekly Challenges

My heart yearns for you

To live – equal – to your full

human potential.

It’s a challenge to raise a daughter in a society that innundates us with countless hidden messages about how girls should look and act, who they should be.    My daughter and I have been talking about this a lot lately, with the holiday marketing of “girls toys” and “boys toys” so in our faces.   So I was pleasantly surprised this week when she found a women’s rights message hidden in Captain Underpants and The Terrifying Return of Tippy Tinkletrousers.

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Captain Underpants.

The bully battle begins!

(Secret feminism.)

You go, girl! You just go and go and GO!

This post, Haikus With My Daughter , Haikus With My Daughter II  and Thanksgiving are a response to the WordPress Weekly Writing Challenge.

8 thoughts on “Haikus With My Daughter III: Girls Rights”

    1. I know, right? It was 100% serendipity – I took the photo while riding in a car in the Kathmandu Valley in September. It was harvest time, and the woman is spreading out corn on the roof to dry in the sun. Thanks for the comment!

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      1. carrico

        Makes me wonder how old she is, what the bag says, were you being scrutinized by her, too. A wildly beautiful woman, proud, suspicious……..So did you sign her up?

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        1. There’s a lot in this photo that makes me wonder, too. That’s why I chose it for the header photo of my blog. I have had other readers comment about the familiarity of the common household items in the photo – the stools, the bamboo tray for separating rice, the large bag of rice. I can tell you that the symbol on the bag is the important Hindu symbol Om (or Aum). Three is important to the symbol – there is a bow, an arrow which symbolizes the self and a mark that symbolize Brahman (Absolute Reality). It also symbolizes the three worlds – earth, atmosphere, and heaven. That’s an over-simplification, of course, but now you know! I don’t know the woman, but this is an area of Nepal I visit often, so I think I will stop and show her the photo next time I am there.

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          1. carrico

            Wonderful. And then take another photo, write another poem–or at least have your daughter write one.
            Ying/Yang’s been on my mind lately. Thanks for into.

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  2. Pingback: Haikus With My Daughter II | The Human Rights Warrior

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