Dear Mr. So and So,

I know it must be confusing.

A black girl!

In an AP class!

What a rare sight to see...

Like a...

pygmy hippopotamus...

shitting out a rainbow...

in the Amazon.

But I am not an anomoly.

Nor am I a statistic.

And I know that I'm thick but damn!

Do I look like I have a million different lips strapped to my face 

spouting out a million different opinions?

For you see

I can barely speak for myself

let alone someone else.

I hardly know my own thoughts

when they get tangled in a speedy ball of firing nuerons;

sometimes when I'm excited

the words barely make it out of my own face

let alone when you ask me to wear the mask

of another's.

So next time we do that unit on "Black America"

and you turn your marshmellow body to me

and ask what

"African Americans"

think about this

don't get offended when I say

"You know, Mr. So and So. I don't know.

I don't know what

they

think.

I don't know what

they

do.

I just know what

I

know.

And here's how

I

feel."

I feel tired of black people asking me why I'm so bougie.

And I'm tired of white people asking me why I speak

so nice.

I'm tired of black people wondering

where the HBCUs are on my college list.

And I'm tired of white people saying that I am a shoo in

simply because of the color of my skin.

For you see I rarely break down into tears

unless I'm doubting my own abilities

like when I was five and my mom gave me that math game

set to her one hundred words per minute typing speed.

But man did I cry

when I thought that people would never see my ACT score

or my GPA

only my skin.

So when I say

I

prefer "African-American"

don't assume "we" all do.

When I say

I

side with Martin Luther King

don't assume "we" all do.

Because, Mr. So and So,

although as a heterosexual cis-white male your opinion is nearly always heard

mine isn't.

And it hurts when you don't ask what "I" think

but what "we"

Sincerly yours,

One in a million