WE...are those girls with colored faces

Walked those Carroll halls with bleeding patience

With the facade of confidence and assimilation

Lured the eyes of boys who

Fear what wanting us means

Sometimes white folks just don’t get

How their privilege stings

 

What poor little colored girls dream?

 

We dream of that new girl many suitors

Bella Swan attention

A world without being the token

Friend type distinction

A way to be successful without

Origami folding ourselves into your doormat

Type celebration

 

We dream of being asked to dance

Taking our hand

As if it weren’t an irrevocable declaration

To be treated as more than an experiment

A lingering, ever-present curiosity

A scapegoat

Us women of color

Are not pieces of meat

That you can say

You tried once

 

We dream of pride

Crystal irises eager,

Unapologetic to see

That crystal slipper fit

 

We dream of love

Cascading

Cliched

Of boundless, criteria-less

Colorless, colorful

Love

 

We dream of representation

Adoration without fetishization

 

Instead, we get

 

Stolen glances and naive hopes

We live these wistful glares

The unwarranted spite

The daughter of searing shame

Reining in lusting hands that later extend

In those dark, dark midnight hours

Eyes groping

Mouths spitting

From those stunted, snarling lips

“I only date white girls”

 

Daydreams

Scorned by the pulsing threat-

The pulsing threat

Of someone knowing

That you want to do more than

Just fuck me over

More than just push me aside

What a curse you’ve been dealt

A hunger that

Surburban barbies just can’t satisfy

 

If only you could see

How we bleed

Again

And again

And again

As if we could rid ourselves

Of this colored curse

 

Oh

But oh we overcame

Dared to pummel the chains

And ploys of your world

This dragon nation

We ravaged your tradition

Dismantling what you once vehemently protected

 

And we’re euphoric

To be set free

And find that the world isn’t flat

That the people that shout in the silence

Aren’t crazy

But brave

Us colored girls

Have to be brave

 

Because

 

We are no longer

Those girls with colored faces

Walked those Carroll halls with bleeding patience

With the facade of confidence and assimilation

Lured the eyes of boys who

Fear what wanting us means

Sometimes- (sigh)

Sometimes white folks just don’t get

How their privilege stings