Sexism in Agriculture: A Poem for Women in Agriculture

by René Settle

Chrysalis Literary and Arts Magazine
Ferrum College, Fall 2021
Editor, Abigail McGovern

René Settle is from Botetourt County, Virginia, majoring in Environmental Studies and minoring in Agricultural Sciences at Ferrum College (in 2021-22, when this poem was published). René hopes to become a soil scientist. Her poem is reprinted here with permission after appearing in the Fall 2021 issue of Chrysalis Literary and Arts Magazine.

For other poems by students about regional and gender stereotypes in Appalachia, see the Fiction and Poems index, or the Index of Student Writing and Illustration in AppLit Pages.

I know all the guys think you’re some pretty young thing,  They’ll whistle and honk at you in their big ol’ trucks, callin’ you “hun” But they don’t know the real you  They don’t know all the work you did during the hot spring  All the times you missed out on having some fun  How your best friend only says one word, “moo” How that little farm is your everything How you know your dad wishes you were a son How you feel like you have so much to live up to How you don’t cry from a bee sting  How you’ve been working and everyone else’s day has just begun How you worked even when you had the stomach flu They think you only want that ring  They don’t know all the work you’ve overdone  And they think they know you just out of the blue? If only you had been a male offspring  Then maybe they’d let you shoot the shotgun Instead of telling you to go make the stew  But know that you can do anything, that you are a king  So don’t stop when a man says, `“you’re done” Because they don’t see the world through your view

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AppLit Fiction and Poems Index
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Index of Student Writing and Illustration in AppLit Pages

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