Women's History

They were here when first this land was settled; 

they came from overseas—they rode the wagons,

poled the flatboats, hiked the mountain trails,

hitched their skirts to wade the rivers,

took their turn as lookouts in the night.

They were here when trees were felled.

They helped to raise the cabin walls

and gather wood for heating.

They labored with their men as equals

through days of hardship and nights of fear;

the forests were full of danger, the land was full of promise.

They helped assure survival and did the work without complaint:

cooking, sewing, caring for the sick,

churning, washing, tending to their children.

They labored with each birth of child, animal, and season.

They cried without tears and sang their babes to sleep.

They built this land and yet their names

are not written in the history books;

they lived lives unknown and unremembered

by those who followed after.

They were wives of scouts and settlers,

hunters and riverboatmen, men honored

in books, on monuments, in songs

that tell their deeds and doings.

They lived, they worked, they died

and laid to rest in  lonesome places

overgrown with weeds and lost to time.

They were here and tamed this land

with their woman’s touch.

Remember them.

For they were here.

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.