War of the Sexes

Now I don’t know much about tennis.

I stick to swimming—that’s my sport.

But I know a little bit about Billie Jean King.

Nationally televised in 1973,

The tennis match to end all tennis matches,

And the woman came out on top.

That must be why they called the match the Battle of the Sexes.

’Cause the War of the Sexes is still raging on,

Because there’s not supposed to be a winner in the end.

There’s supposed to be equality.

Two sexes protected by the same star-spangled banner,

But that protection is just a hoax,

A flat serve to make us think we have a chance when really, men are already at game point,

This close to taking control of freedoms meant to be shared.

Meanwhile, women dodge topspin after topspin,

Rape culture here, the wage gap there,

The pink tax hovering in the middle.

Three sets of two-word problems, and the last might be less familiar.

What’s the pink tax?

It’s the three extra dollars you pay for a woman’s razor

So you can shave your legs as cleanly as your boyfriend shaves his face.

And they don’t just raise the price for women’s razors

It’s for shampoo, deodorant, shaving cream, dry cleaning, facewash,

The pink tax.

The price of female products soars

So women continue to pour money down the drain,

Buying moisturizer that differs from her boyfriend’s in price, not content.

Oh, I’m sorry if the end seemed like mansplaining.

A penny for your thoughts.

But, if you’re a man, it’s a dollar for your thoughts.

78 cents for mine.

But I’d wager to say that the wage gap

Is just a gap in perception for men and women.

Living in this same world but seeing contrasting images

As far apart as a lob versus a drop-shot,

And you’re damn right it’s 2017 and this shouldn’t be an issue,

But it is,

And it won’t stop being an issue until there’s no material left for poets to work with behind a mic like this.

That legendary tennis match happened 44 years ago,

And we just elected our 45th male president.

Cue the women’s white flags waving.

And for people who say this War,

Not just a Battle, but a War

Of the Sexes will come to a conclusion in time,

I don’t know if I can serve it to the hands of another man named Father Time.

All we women have is Mother Nature.

And if she controls nature,

Then where is that rat’s ass I could give about men and women already being equal?

Oh.

I must have left it at home,

I had no room for it because I did not buy a purse and women’s jeans don’t have real pockets.

So I’m sorry I don’t have a rat’s ass to give,

But I don’t go anywhere without my sharp tongue.

So let me say the gender gap is alive and well,

But it’s also outdated, like the idea that women belong in the kitchen,

And the only thing I’m cooking up is some food for thought in this poem.

Billie Jean King might have honored women in the Battle of the Sexes,

But her last name is as masculine as they come.

So King is my queen,

And Riggs might’ve gone to the match in a Sugar Daddy jacket

But intelligent women don’t need a sugar daddy to make them feel sweet,

Just a few thousand in scholarship money.

Now I told you I stick to swimming,

But if tennis is what it takes to start a revolution,

Then we can all learn the algorithms of that athleticism,

Take it from the tennis court to a courtroom,

And fight a real war worth fighting.

We might not have been allowed on the frontlines until two years ago,

But this is a war that all women have been fighting for a long time.

And we will fight it from the tennis tournament of 1973,

To a random city’s poetry expo in 2017.

We’re not searching for a winner.

We’re just trying to end this War of the Sexes,

Because it was never supposed to exist in the first place.