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164 

“The Blonde Woman’s Kitchen” 
Sharifa Patel 

 
Sharifa Patel is a third year student at the University of Toronto.  She is majoring in 

History and Caribbean Studies and minoring in English.  She is particularly interested 

in the historical effects of colonialism on women and how they persist today.  

 
 

So it was in the past. 
Where pink faced babies nuzzled up to the breasts of slave women. 

To take the milk meant for slave babies. 
Blonde mothers: 

Pushed their babies into the arms of dark eyed women. 
So it is now. 

Women who travel thousands of miles; 
Women who cross seas 

Leaving their babies 
Alone. 

Crying babies. 
Babies with far away mothers; 

Mothers forced to work in the blonde woman’s kitchen. 
Mothers forced to care for the blonde woman’s children. 

The blonde woman. 
The blonde woman’s child. 

The blonde woman’s child is nursed by a woman who crosses seas. 
The blonde woman’s child is held by a woman from the south. 

The blonde woman’s child feeds off the affection 
Meant for the children of the far away women. 

Those children, 
Far away, 

Cry for the far away women. 
The blonde woman, 

caught up in feminist theory. 
Theories to liberate woman. 

Give women the ability; 
Equal pay for equal work. 

Feminist Theory. 
To save the women of the world. 

To teach women from across seas and from the south 
How to liberate themselves from their male oppressors, 

And work diligently in a blonde woman’s kitchen.