melissaahowells - When You Learn Who You Really Are And What Is...

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they're
hiding in plain white
fleeing their ethnicity
pretending be
what they'd like to appear to be
a kind of lying otherness

there's a whole lot of dark
and darkness
in the white
'specially
those folks who want to suntan
in the summertime
but couldn't pick a darker crayola
out of the box
even out of pure self-spite

try as they might
they don't ever quite
complete the task
though they want so to fit in
not down with what they see as
their own hidden ugliness
but oh they do try and try
hurting themselves

and maybe that's why
and how....
I learned to hate me
when I was too small to know better
didn't know who or what I was/be
but knew that someone (like me)
didn't quite fit the whole hole with my key
joining together my puzzle pieces
ought to make one feel happy
on the inside
and free

but
it was painful to smooth my edges
when I had stand-up prickly scales
it was painful to want to rise up to some yard stick
when I couldn't measure my wind
to inflate their sails
(that wasn't the right journey
circum-navigating their world for me...)

aren't we all made differently
and different is what
I was taught
is all that pleases God best
isn't that what's taught little children
in Sunday catechisms...
that we're all no more or no less
than all the various colors
showing up in the world

God doesn't state
his preferences

but then you got
boarding schools
and private white schools
and bussing laws
and different bathrooms and doorways
and sitting in the back
and bully pulpit paws
beating down with words and opinions and policies
and state government regulations and laws
the Lord cannot help you sometimes
if you aren't the right cause

and sometimes they tell you
its got to be like this
because that's just the way it is
and always shall be
(so you must endeavor to persevere)

some white people
don't know what real darkness is
I wonder if they ever
looked long in the mirror
and not see goodness in their reflection
with their freshly tanned skin
and there white so right perfections

ain't it the biz...
when you learn who you really are
and what is...

God didn't make up this world
maybe the fake boss-man did?

LEGAL COPYRIGHT FOR THIS POEM DIRECTLY WRITTEN TO THE PAGE
6:35PM PACIFIC STANDARD TIME AUGUST 10 2022
AND ALSO FOR THIS WRITER MELISSA A. HOWELLS
AND ALSO FOR THIS LEGALLY COPYRIGHTED AND REGISTERED SITE TITLE
MELOO STRAIGHT FROM HER TILT-A-WORLD@ 2022

I'M NO RACIST...JUST AN OBSERVING IN AN UNOBSERVANT WORLD.