The Lucky Chance

“All I ask, is the Priviledge for my Masculine Part the Poet in me, (if any such you will allow me) to tread in those successful Paths my Predecessors have so long thriv’d in, to take those Measures that both the Ancient and Modern Writers have set me, and by which they have pleas’d the World so well. If I must not, because of my Sex, have this Freedom, but that you will usurp all to your selves; I lay down my Quill, and you shall hear no more of me, no not so much as to make Comparisons, because I will be kinder to my Brothers of the Pen, than they have been to a defenceless Woman; for I am not content to write for a Third day only. I value Fame as much as if I had been born a Hero; and if you rob me of that, I can retire from the ungrateful World, and scorn its fickle Favours.” – Aphra Behn (1640-1689).

It’s an old saw, an old song,
An old never-ending scandal:
A stage of indecencies
Unfit for Ladies,
Whose ears should not prick
but for the nib of the Critick
Who censures in satiable
Masculine Strokes.

Stuff ‘em!
Screw ‘em!
There is nowt obscene in
The joyfull’st Woman alive.