Not until you can see the pain in our eyes, the scars on our skin, the protruding ribs and distended stomachs of malnourishment, till you can gape at small black bodies disfigured by kwashiorkor and colonization, till you can gasp at people that don’t look like you being branded like cattle, like animals on their way to the slaughterhouse
(and thank goodness we’ve come so far, things used to be so bad)

Not until you can marvel at the mottled marks of a whip, the black and blue bruising only white hands can inflict, till you can shake your head at teens boldly drinking under a whites only sign, till you can cover your mouth and peek through fingers at the water hoses, the dogs, the guns, the blood— black blood on black bodies in black and white photographs
(and you inwardly sigh, relieved that it was so long ago and so far away)

Not until you can retweet teenagers face to face with riot gear and tear gas, till you can shake your head and show that you’re different because your black studies class told you so, till you can give a 40 character message about how sickening the violence is, but you keep watching the videos of him her him her him her him her him her
them
shot choked kicked punched beaten whipped slapped
killed
by government sanctioned executioners

Not until you can see everything but understand nothing

Always have to be ugly raw hurting bleeding suffering
Why can’t we be smiling laughing eating dancing breathing

Why can’t we be smiling

Why