Nasty Woman

By Nina Mariah Donovan 

I'm a Nasty Woman.
Not as nasty as a man who looks like he bathes in cheeto dust.
Not as nasty a man who is a diss track to America.
From Back to broken Back he's stomped on, his words are just more white noise ruining this national anthem.
I'm not as nasty as confederate flags being tattooed across my city;
maybe the south actually is going to rise again
Or maybe it never really fell
Because we're still drowning in vanilla coated power
Slavery has just been reinterpreted into the prison system
Black lives are still in shackles and graves just for being black in front of people who see melanin as animal skin
Tell me of a decade that didn't have traces of white hoods burning up our faith in humanity.
I'm not as nasty as a swastika painted on a pride flag
And I didn't know that devils could be resurrected but I feel Hitler in these streets
A mustache traded in for a Toupee 
The Nazis renamed The Cabinet 
Conversion therapy the new gas chamber,
Shaming and electrocuting the gay out of America
turning rainbows into suicide notes.
I'm not as nasty as racism, or fraud, or homophobia, sexual assault, transphobia, white supremacy, white privilege, ignorance, or misogyny
Not as nasty as trading girls like pokemon before their bodies have even evolved.
Not as nasty as your own daughter being your favorite sex symbol
Like wet dreams infused with your own genes.
But yeah!
I'm a nasty woman.
A phunky
Crusty
Bitchy
Loud
Nasty woman.
Not as nasty as the combo of Trump and Pence being served into my voting booth, 
But I'm nasty like the battles women fought to get me in that voting booth.
Nasty like the fight to close the wage gap.
Nasty like conversations trying to remind people there is such thing as a wage gap.
Tell me that this is only because women usually go into lower paying fields.
So why did last year's top actresses make less than half of what the top actors did?
Do you realize that the World Cup shelf of the U.S. men's soccer team is as empty as Trump's promises
But the women's team has scored three World Cups,
In 2015, brought in 20 million more dollars in revenue than the men's team,
but is still paid 75% less?
See even when women go into high paying careers, their wages are still cut with blades sharpened by testosterone.
Tell me why the work of a black woman and a hispanic women is only worth 63 and 54 percent of a white man's privileged paycheck?
This is not a feminist myth;
this is inequality.
So we are not here to be debunked
We are here to be respected.
We are here to be nasty
like blood stained bedsheets.
In case you forgot,
women don't choose when or if they get their periods!
Trust me, if could we would!
We don't like throwing away our favorite pairs of underwear!
But men can choose to not have sex
And they know how to live without a full head of hair,
so why are tampons and pads still taxed, but Viagra and Rogaine isn't?
Is your erection really more important than protecting the messy parts of my womanhood?
Is the thinning of your hair really more embarrassing than the period-staining of my jeans?
I know it seems petty to complain about a few extra cents
But it's just the finishing touch on a pile of change I have yet to feel in this country.
So don't try to justify our injustices with excuses that smell like your security when you're walking alone to the bathroom
or your car
or down the street.
Security my eyes have yet to see
Their too busy praying to my feet
So you don't mistake eye contact for wanting physical contact
I've been zipping up my smile so you don't think I want to unzip your jeans.
I know you forget to examine the reflection of your own privilege
You may be afraid of the truth
But I'm not afraid to be honest
I'm not afraid to be nasty
Yeah I'm nasty
like the struggle of women still beating equality into the world,
because our rights have been beaten out of us for too long.
And our fight will continue to embody our nastiness.
I'm nasty like red, white, and blue bruises.
Nasty like Elizabeth, Amelia, Rosa, Eleanor, Condoleezza, Sonia, Malala, Michelle.
Our mothers, our sisters, us sisters are all nasty like history
And our pussies
ain't for grabbing
They're for reminding you that our walls are stronger than America's ever will be.
They're for birthing new generations of
Filthy
Vulgar
Bossy
Brave
Proud
Nasty women.
So if you a nasty woman
say hell yeah.

Ashley Judd read a version of this poem at the 2017 Women's March in Washington D.C.   The original poem can be seen and heard performed here.