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Featured Image: Lucxama Sylvain
Aged eleven I knew
Black was not beautiful
That my 4c coils, dark brown skin, and protruding curves
Made me too big, loud, and ugly
Not blond enough, small enough, or white enough
I was a sore thumb in a sea of white
A sidekick in some white girl’s life
Nice black girl or better sacrifice
Uphold, uplift, and hold down
They told me.
By thirteen I knew there was danger
In leggings, jeggings, tight tops,
And tiny things,
That cover up and look down
Were my sword and shield
In this unspoken war against the world
Always fighting with this heavy black back
Against the wall I built for safety
Knowing they tore you down for parts to wear
To look exotic, hip, and cool
These people speaking of strong black women.
So by seventeen I chose to be a nun
Buying clothes two sizes too big
And never acting too grown
Lest they saw that as a reason
To sample my young body like a cheap
Slice of grocery store cheese speared through
A toothpick
So by twenty-something I broke down
From the weight of being a black girl
In a white world
Always squeezing myself in places I did not belong
Putting out fires in the streets
While they danced in nightclubs unaware
I was always running from these stereotypes
Ain’t nobody taught me how to fight.
