Equal rights for blacks and women…
 
The negroes and the women all been talkin' about rights.
It looks like for the white man things are gettin' pretty tight.
I hear men say that women need man's guidance, his care -
A hand up in the carriage and the best place anywhere.
They don't help me in the carriage,
They don't help me cross the puddles,
They don't save the best seat just for me.
 
And ain't I a woman? Look at me, look at my arms.
Ain't I a woman? I have plowed and planted.
Ain't I a woman? I have brought the harvest to the barn
And no man could best me, no man could do more.
 
What's the size of your brain got to do with your rights?
Maybe yours holds a quart, mine holds only a pint.
What you do with it matters, and wouldn't you be mean
To begrudge me my little cup,
Not to let me have my own. And I ask you
 
Ain't I a woman? I could work as much as any man.
Ain't I a woman? I could eat as much, too.
Ain't I a woman? I have borne the lash of slavery
As well as any man, O lord, as well as any man.
 
If the first woman that God ever made
Could turn the world upside down,
Then surely we women can put it back again
And turn it right side up -
And the men had better let us. 'Cause
 
Ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children.
Ain't I a woman? Seen them sold in slavery.
Ain't I a woman? When I cried out my mother's grief
None but Jesus heard, none but Jesus heard.
 
They say women can't have as much rights as men
'Cause Christ wasn't a woman.
Where do you think the Christ came from?
From God and from a woman.
Man had nothing to do with him. And
 
Ain't I a woman? Yes you are, Sojourner Truth.
Ain't I a woman? Yes, you be all woman.
Ain't I a woman? Just like Mary, just like Eve you are.
Sojourner Truth is my name
And I got no more to say.

Sojourner Truth was a Woman © 1994 by Nelle Calkins