‘Black is my happy color’, they say,
Yet would they choose to be as dark as dusk?
‘Black is more than a color; it’s a mood’,
Would they embrace it, as their skin’s shade?
Weight of rejection, often, made me feel
Of being measured, visibly and invisibly,
The shade of my skin, being far left on the scale,
Where fairness reigns, and darkness seems to fail.
Harsh childhood days, a test of my heart,
Ignored, overlooked, sidelined, unchosen
Tears became friends, as it understood my pain,
And the bias flowed-
Like a pricking endless chain.
In a circle of family, I stood alone,
The odd one out, on skin tone
Elders whispered worries of my fate,
As my color would determine my state.
But amidst it all, my mother stood by me
Like A crow sees gold in its child’s wings,
As in her eyes, I was, more than anything
With love in her eyes, she silenced my fear.
I found my strength in a different way.
Finding out “Beauty is only skin deep”
Casting aside, the stigma of darkness
My confidence grew, as I embraced-
My skin - like the only shade I knew.
As In the beauty of night, in shadows deep,
There’s a power in black that makes hearts leap.
For darkness holds mystery, beauty untold,
And in my dark skin, I find my soul’s gold…