Equality

• Jamie Oliver, Grade 10, Donnybrook District High School -
• Poetry
• 2018

2nd in the 'Horizon of Dreams 2018' competition

To the man that thinks it’s okay to call women weak,
sometimes words are more powerful than actions if you would just let her speak.
To the father that says boys shouldn’t cry,
how would you want him to react when it was your time to say goodbye?
To the people that think it’s funny to bully people just for their clothes,
they already have issues that you don’t know about, to deal with back home.
To the person that thinks it’s funny to make racial slurs about someone’s skin colour,
to be honest, inside, we are not that much different from one another.
To the person that brings someone down just because of their religion,
wouldn’t you want to stand up for what you believe in?
To the child that made fun of his classmate for his disability,
his disability is just a mask hiding his amazing personality.
And to the parents that are disappointed in their child for being gay,
why is it that if they were straight you wouldn’t have much to say?
What I don’t understand is why can’t we just accept people for who they are?
And why is the road to equality so far?