Sometimes I feel just like a tree -
there are those who love and admire me
and those who'd like to cut me down
and some who'd like to shape
and mould me to their needs
but I don't want to be a chair and sat upon -
I want to be a tree
reaching for the highest heights
branching out to see the world
from different points of view
touching depths that no one would suspect
until they tried to topple me
and found the going tough -
but even if they managed it
deep deep down
I know I have the means
to work my way back up.
I wrote this poem in the early nineties when I was working on an educational magazine spotlighting gender equity. I found it among a pile of papers today and I realised all this time later in 2017 we are still grappling with inequality and discrimination across many areas such as gender, age, disability, sexual preference, religion and race. How can this be when the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights states that ALL PEOPLE are EQUAL before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to the EQUAL protection of the law? And so it is that I dedicate this simple little poem to the LGBTI beautiful individuals who at this moment in 2017 seek the human rights, fairness and equality that should rightly be theirs by law.
