#poc
Let me set the scene
The sun is shining
Time to fill my day with play
The illuminated field of grass calls to me
Like my soft blankets after a hard weeks work.
Should I take off my shirt?
I don’t want tan lines.
Tan lines?
Tan lines.
What are those?
You know,
When your skin has a line where
“Darker tan skin meets lighter tan skin”
Tan?
Tan.
What is tan.
You know,
You know a darker flesh tone.
Flesh tone?! Oh no,
Here we go.
What is flesh tone?
Flesh?
Tone?
Flesh, our skin.
It comes in all different shades of pinks, oranges, and red.
No there’s different shades of black and white.
No one is white, truly.
You know what I mean!
No! I don’t, I really don’t.
I mean,
There are people who exist with the complexion of fresh fallen snow.
Oh no,
Here we go.
Snow is made of ice which is made of water.
Last time I checked water is blue.
We were talking about you!
Well now we are onto something more important!
You seriously think water is blue?
It’s an optical illusion!
Can’t you see?
You fool.
And your stupid tan lines.
If they bother you so much take your shirt off!
Don’t be more than one shade! You have to make sense!
You have to blend in!
You have to be perfect!
Woah. Wait a minute.
Weren’t we having a nice time in the sun?
Well brain,
I was trying to.
But now I feel like I’m in sin.
Sep 5, 2021
Sep 5, 2021 at 4:24 PM UTC
how long
will this song
play on repeat?
when will they
hear it?
Jun 1, 2020
Jun 1, 2020 at 4:18 PM UTC
This country was built on broken backs
yet we still have to crawl on broken glass
Beg for mercy and thank you warmly
when you lift the boot from our throats
lest we come off as uncivilized--
your comfort is worth more than our lives
Jun 1, 2020
Jun 1, 2020 at 10:45 AM UTC
Every time they speak
Of injustice in the streets
A silence is born
We watch the cries of widows
And hide beneath our pale skin
Nov 1, 2019
Nov 1, 2019 at 8:16 PM UTC
you sit in your pulpit all holier than thou
claiming if it was the 50's
you would fight in the civil rights movement
but now you are sitting back doing nothing
so
shut the **** up
you don't get to watch kids being
pulled from their parents and do nothing
while saying you would have fought for
people of color
you are lying there is no other way to put it
you ******* coward
and by the way the fight for
people of color isn't over so
get off your *** or shut up
Apr 22, 2019
Apr 22, 2019 at 12:41 PM UTC
how about we
focus on
the blood
that’s painting
our streets red
and not on
the blood that
i can’t help
but shed
there is a
difference.
one of them
is unnatural.
Sep 23, 2018
Sep 23, 2018 at 4:22 AM UTC
we are the people
of contrast.
storm in the cloud.
glory in the blood.
joy despite fury.
peace in the flowerbeds.
Sep 23, 2018
Sep 23, 2018 at 4:21 AM UTC
I am a feminist
Feeling fenced in
in a gender binary
fenced in a ****** binary
so people dismiss my Bi
No ally can stop that without listening
Listen with your ears and if you can't hear
listen with your eyes. Know that I don't need to prove my Bi
Yemen child brides, committing homicide
building graveyards inside of themselves
Acid attacks, police and blacks
**** is asked for
Jews are gassed more
Conversion therapy
People can't see through the Trans*parency
Gender roles wrapped up into us
Making us feel trapped making us adapt
A is not for Allys
A is for Ace or Aro
Thrown with a bow I miss the target
cast into the shadow
Lesbians are loved stripped down
but not in the gown
appreciated more with their mouths shut
and no ones mind open
They chose to be blind not see with their eyes
hear with your ears
hear the gunshot or the scream from the queer kid
who is bleeding, smiles were misleading
thought they were happy
Thats because we stigmatize mental illness
I feel the stillness of progress
My anxiety is as bad as the start
I've been told that l'm not being smart
but I know my voice is a work of art
We whitewash the shadow
using bleach to whiten skin
drinking bleach when that skin isn't light to begin
I am a feminist
Aug 15, 2018
Aug 15, 2018 at 6:40 PM UTC
what my ancestors gave me
(the curves of my body
the curls in my hair
the swell of my *******
the wetness between my legs)
was not meant to be colonized.
Apr 20, 2018
Apr 20, 2018 at 2:43 AM UTC
The subtle cross between intersections, a life of blurriness, through crossed t’s and neatly dotted i’s I removed from the phrase Poetic Form, (trying to spell it without crossing myself back into it).
From lesbianism to manhood,
to cross what being a man means,
I wonder if my own identity is written in pen and everyone wants it typed and edited,
Yet I’ve taken the plastic keys off my computer board and made them into magnets last week,
Setting myself up with stolen magnets stolen blocks,
Putting them in order on my own fridge,
Scrambling them back because there is no order,
They only told you there was so that way you’d sing a song,
But I know now that I can write words, there’s no need for a pre-prescribed song when I’ve written my own,
In my own words.
When I look back and have pages of songs nobody else asked for or decided to write,
When I’m in class and I pocket my songs into stories and my stories under my low grades,
Under my teachers’ requests for MLA format,
I think of that caterpillar I played with in my room when I was six,
And how i thought about how people only wrote about butterflies
And how the caterpillars felt about that,
So when I asked my mother to ask her friend, an author,
If she’d write me into a novel,
Would she ignore me because I was a caterpillar,
Only choosing to open her mouth and write when my story became beautiful and socially acceptable,
When it grew out from the pubescent disliking of itself and stained the sinks of society,
Out of a hot *** of queer and quarantine,
Till the broth of the fluidity of my own being was was down the rabbit hole
Till all that was left was whitewashed spaghetti?
If these songs were anything I could write down again and again,
In pen, ignoring the requests to write neater,
To type faster,
If I put all my work into an envelope I already broke,
Shove it into a mailbox decorated with things people disagree with,
My pages bleeding ink few people can touch without being soaked,
When they ask me what to file me under
I don’t say “minority fiction” anymore
I say file me under “road signs”
At the intersections.
File me under that caterpillar,
In the wheat field,
Next to hydrangeas on the dinner table
A Sunflower in the spring
The harvested Brown Rice,
So when you make me into a meal I didn’t ask for,
I can be at least eaten by the vegans.
Feb 26, 2018
Feb 26, 2018 at 1:44 AM UTC
Always love deeply.
Be with someone who knows they can't stop the world for you, but will help you make your path on planet Earth with them.
Change what you don't like. The world built for one group of people and it wasn't us. We are a community, every minority, and the world was built to destroy us, not for us to change it. Change it anyway.
Don't listen to people who don't think you can. "Too idealist" isn't a thing. You can be the dreamer and the person who makes them come true.
Education isn't everything. If you go through high school and find out school isn't for you, that's up to you.
Family isn't blood, it's who's there when nobody else is.
Grades aren't everything. There are plenty of well off people who have failed classes\courses\assignments.
History lies. It only tells one side, like everything was black and white. Do your own research.
Identity is important. Respect your own and others.
Joke carefully. If nobody finds it funny, it's not funny. If you wouldn't say it in front of me don't say it.
Kindness can get you far. Every interaction you have means something. It shapes you into who you are and aren't. It alters the world, even in the slightest way.
Love is respect first. Then adoration and all the other more exciting things.
Mental health is just as important as physical health.
Never be afraid to try something new.
Observe your surroundings.
Pick your battles or be one hell of a fighter.
Question everything.
Read anytime you can.
Sexuality and gender identity are fluid.
Take photos.Selfies.Pictures of everything you see.
Use your resources.
Value everything you have and everything you don't.
Wear whatever makes you comfortable. Clothes have no gender.
Xe is an gender neutral pronoun.
You are important to the world, even when it don't feel like it.
Zealousness is never bad.
Jul 3, 2017
Jul 3, 2017 at 4:16 AM UTC
Black and white movies
play behind us
As I make you question
The whole **** world.
Mind ****
Is what you call my theories,
My stories,
My questions,
My answers.
“Is that bad?”
I ask you. You
tell me I never could tell
when you were interested
or were telling me it was bad.
I suppose you’re right.
Babe,
you ask later,
as I read,
and you watch the movie,
what is the quadratic formula?
I don’t look up
but I can feel
that **** near perfect smile.
You always do this,
ask me random questions
that aren’t useful anymore
at not least to us.
So I recite it.
And you laugh.
And I laugh.
And we continue being together
Doing different.
You ask me several more
Over the course of the movies and books.
What is flash fiction?
What is life?
What is **** made from?
Do you know that Mark Twain novel—?
Yes, I love your questions.
I love you.
Babe,
you say,
What is love?
I don’t respond.
I want to say another
dictionary definition
but it doesn’t come out.
“Mind **** I say.
Jun 24, 2017
Jun 24, 2017 at 12:57 AM UTC
I’m
a black,
queer,
atheist,
woman ***
???? (gender).
Life is going to be so hard.
Jun 24, 2017
Jun 24, 2017 at 12:53 AM UTC
I have tried many ways to think of her but
Astronomy was the only way I could write on.
I've tried to comfort her out of despair, but
I couldn't find the words to take her out of pain.
When I heard he made her cry,
I wanted to take the pain out of her,
put them into his face and my fists as
I hit him into the oblivion space we know space to be, and
him see the stars closer than any telescope had seen.
I wouldn't mind being in pain for a little while so
the sun could dry her tears,
she was trying so hard to hide.
Would it be so terrible for me to remind her
how the stars bowed in her presence?
Would It be so terrible for me to show her
nobody sees the stars
and the beauty of night anymore
because they are afraid of her
and the beauty she brings?
I too scared to ask if she knows
how you left her after class
to scream at the universe for
making her believe
she was anything less,
than the closest thing to perfection
the universe has to offer. Does she
know how you've collected books of
nebulas in your heads that show when
she decides to laugh? Does she know
you how hard this is for you, to sit here
and smile and joke like your heart
doesn't break with hers as you see her
in a pain deeper than imaginable and you
know it. It spans across all universes and expands
further than your love of poetry and your longing to
hug her and tell her it's going to be okay, but
you know that's not true,
and you can never make that true.
So you sit here,
and write a love poem never to be read,
because that means something would die inside you
or her
if you shared how much of the universe you could give to her
how much of the universe
and the stars
and the planets
and the comets
and meteors
you could shower her with
if she knew how beautiful she was....
Jun 24, 2017
Jun 24, 2017 at 12:37 AM UTC
Maybe I believe there's more to your heart than colored skin thoughts, thoughts of a blanket death, intent to devastate the space for differences maybe I believe it is innate, truly human to set fright aside for the good of futures, then what are you? Hateful eyes disguise the beauty in you designed to shine among the others but I can't teach through resistant bitterness and I won't speak when it means I only speak to waste my breath on you, on you.
Jun 12, 2017
Jun 12, 2017 at 6:37 PM UTC
I'm a black actor
So my monologues are gospel
my dialogues are political
my blocking is a statment
My diction is forgiven
I'm a black actor
So Shakespeare speaks above my melanin,
Avant guarde is a canvas too fresh for color
And the urban expierence
Is a glove that fits too well to remove
I'm a black actor
So my casting is guaranteed
My bio line is their defense against vulturous social critics circling the audition table
They need a black actor
I'm a black actor
Jan 15, 2017
Jan 15, 2017 at 2:31 PM UTC
What I want to know is why?
Why am I told to remember the tragedy of 9/11, but when I bring up the tragedy of my people once enslaved, I am told that it was years ago and I should “get over it”?
Why when I make a joke at a Caucasian friend’s expense does his face grow disgusted and he spats the word racist at me, then turns around and make a joke at a black man’s expense and expects me to laugh?
Why am I told that I am “boring” or that “no one likes being around an angry black woman” when I rise up to speak about the obstacles all people of color face in the modern society?
Why is it that my Caucasian friends are allowed to rely stories of being called racist with voices grim and shocked, but if I ask, “Well, were you being racist?” they look at me as if I’ve offended them?
Why is it a normal thing for people of color to rise and speak about their experiences of being a minority, only to have a Caucasian person slap a metaphorical hand over their mouth by saying, “You’re not the only one who’s experienced racism”?
Why as a child growing up was I taught by society that darker skin was less desirable, that if I was dark I shouldn’t wear pastel bright colors, that my blackness isn’t worshipped, but now in modern day society I am forced to watch Caucasians wear weave, get braids, do things they consider “being black” and have praise rain down on them?
Why should I have to listen to my Caucasian friends use the word ***** as if their ancestors didn’t pronounce the word the same way someone would call a dog a mutt?
Why when I asked my Caucasian friend to explain why her crush wasn’t her type, she mentioned his blackness not as a worry that someone might not agree, or because years ago it wouldn’t be allowed, or as a concern that the way the modern world seems to be against him, but as if his blackness deemed him less dateable?
Why?
Apr 10, 2016
Apr 10, 2016 at 2:53 AM UTC
Do you know the meaning of "stop and frisk"?
I'm sorry black brother, you do.
Have you ever had to change your voice in order to get a job?
I'm sorry black sister, you have.
Have you ever had to remove your hijab because you needed to take a flight?
I'm sorry brown girl, you have.
Has anyone ever insisted you have extensive knowledge on every school subject?
I'm sorry yellow friend, someone has.
Have you ever been told to go back to your country, despite the fact that you're already there?
I'm sorry red man, you have.
Have you ever been called and illegal immigrant, but you were born in the u.s?
I'm sorry Latino friend, you have.
Have you ever been told that racism doesn't exist and, by someone with pale skin?
I know I have.
So this is to the ones who have been told that they "aren't black enough" because they use proper grammar and their pants don't sag.
The brown boys with beards that get called "towel heads"
To the Asian kids that are just as smart as the next guy.
To the native Americans that still get called Indians.
To the brown girls that get told that they don't have to wear their scarves because "we're in America"
Jul 9, 2015
Jul 9, 2015 at 10:07 AM UTC