Today is just like any other day
I'm barely awake
The water runs as
I think of everything I don't want to face
I look back all the time
Remembering where I've been and where I've come from
My face is just a lie
My heart is seeking home

My home is my roots
Deep down within me
I'm a soul encased in white flesh
But there's a story to me

I try to behave
Everyday, all I ever do is behave
I remember in middle school
I heard on some women's talk show
That good girls don't make history
I would repeat that to myself as a teen
Now all I repeat is daily drudgery

I have expectations on my shoulders
And I'm surrounded by white people,
But I'm not like them
They claw onto their intellect
As if they know what suffering is
Their hearts are shiny, well polished glass
There is nothing in them
And they easily crack
No substance or meaning
Beyond their roles
White people, white people
With white souls

But I'm from Brooklyn,
does that make a difference to you?
I've known suffering
But not in the way some of my dark-skinned peers have suffered
I was just the white girl to them in school
My skin represented the source of their oppression
Some subconsciously hated me
I felt like a pariah,
I have always felt like a pariah
Clamoring to fit in

The best route to fitting in
I found,
was self deprecating humor
And acts of senseless rebellion
Or just becoming so quiet that no one would notice me
Now that I'm surrounded by white people,
Nothing has changed
They're the type of white people who glorify knowledge
I love to learn
But they are straight up elitist about intelligence and education
But what else can you expect from privileged white people?

My skin in some ways makes me privileged,
But I also am not the type of white
that comes from money
My family is not the type of white that is devoid of trauma
We're not the type of white who are bland, coldly intellectual, and superficial

But this poem isn't about flesh
It's about being ****** an outcast
Forever being misunderstood by a spectrum of people
While I deeply understand every person that crosses my path
No one seems to be able to understand me
And *******, that's lonely.

I'm merely a sail in the wind
I have no preference,
North, South, East, West
Take me in any direction,
As long as it's God-led

I just want to be an autumn leaf
I just want to sink softly back to the ground that birthed me

My mind is busy,
Everyone's mind is busy
Adulthood is busy,
Always so busy

I forgot the child I was
and her dreams
Her aspirations, her goals
Her feelings, her thoughts
Her inner knowings
Everything she loved
Everything she lost

Will I ever be her again?

There is a longing here,
in my heart

I want innocence.

Revolving doors
Spinning round
Only getting back to where I started,
Always

This is a prayer
For those down on their knees
Begging a foreign God above
to bring an end to their unease
A prayer for those who turn to various vices
to temporarily lift the constant pain of a tortured life
I just want you to know
God sees your pain,
God sees your strife
But most importantly
Behind all the chaos
God sees you
and He loves you unconditionally

Maybe you don't know what real love is
Maybe your parents were cruel and neglectful
Maybe kids at school bullied you
Maybe you feel as if you have never fit in
No one ever loved you fully
Loved both your lovely aspects and your sins

But I can assure you
There is a God
Who takes an interest in you
Who cares for your every hidden hurt
that you hide away in shame
The world does not know how to love,
this is true
It is spilling over with hate
But see, God
He love you just for you
God always seeks out the goodness in our hearts
It doesn't matter how far gone you feel you are
You are always invited to be a son or daughter of God

Jesus died a brutal death
So that you wouldn't have to be in ******* to
the endless lies of this world
You can be set free by love, truth and peace
I invite you to experience God first hand
the way I have
I can't guarantee that people are going to love you the way you need to be loved,
But I can guarantee that God is a stable foundation
that can't be destroyed
Build your life upon the foundation of God
and revel in the joy that comes with being fully convinced that you are loved by the Creator of the universe.

You don't need anything else in this world but God,
trust me.

I walked to the mirror when I woke
I noticed that pieces of myself still lingered on my bed
cracked fragments of plaster made a trail behind me with my every step

I looked into that mirror
That mirror that told truths I did not want to know
It revealed a face wrought by troubles
A soul diseased with woes

This plaster was my makeshift armor
that I encased my too delicate self into
The plaster was hard and white
and just beneath it was my spirit
Still intact, though it only emitted a faint light

I can still recall a time
When I was allowed to broadcast my spirit
in all her riveting splendor
She was a kaleidoscope of lights
like the aurora borealis
dancing among the stars

But these systems and these expectations
Knotted her into limitation
Suffocating her every dream
and damning her to a life of monotony and trivilaity
Surrounding her with people
Who don't have the eyes to see
A destiny beyond their constant, choreographed agony

I quieted my mind
And pondered all these things in my heart
I took a sledge hammer
to the remaining plaster on my body
My armor broke to pieces
Strewn out on the floor, no longer serving as protection
and suffocation
I can finally breathe again.

My spirit is regaining her health
Soon she will soar
I'm stepping out on this journey
And though in leaving the past there is so much uncertainty
I think with glee:
Oh, the things this magical existence has in store!