Selective Memory

Tue, 04/21/2015 - 17:37 -- Alonyia

 

Will you remember her?
The Black girl deferred?
Will you open up your tattered scrapbook
And turn to the page
Reminiscing on the time that you poached her heritage
With your tired observations of pro-style edges and lips that fill her smile with history and longing
Will you look back on the time
You shamed her tattered heart and namebrand Jordans
The time that you branded her with names
She had no room left enough to bear
So Bitch, Hoe and Thottie taint her vernacular,
stain her brown eyes,, until the mere sight of her reflection is too cluttered for her to see her own beauty
Will you? Remember her?
I know her face isn't that remarkable
But the marks you left on her self-worth are your signature
Her BACK is unrecognizable from all the heel and boot prints you left in her mahogany skin
Because it seems that you moving on up came with a price that you deemed her Black enough to pay
Her blood is undeniable
The red, yellow and green hidden away in her veins like sunken treasure
Forming puddles at feet worn ragged from marching to a promised land
Will you remember her?
As you breathe on borrowed air on stolen time
Will she cross your mind?
Will you recall the girl with cracks in her spine from hanging her head
So low she rendered nooses unnecessary
Will her face pierce you in your darkest hours of thought
Or will you deem each wound inflicted on her soul as an isolated incident?
I wonder will she ever cross your mind
Or like a sentimental souvenir
Will you tuck away the shred of pride you managed to rip
Away from a young girl with the audacity to believe that she is enough
Well I will remember her
I will never forget
Every morning I rise I will comfort her restless heart
And remind her that despite the forgetfulness of her perpetrators
The lapsed memories of her assailants, she is not forgotten
And I will never let her fall to the masses of the downtrodden
Because she is me
And I am her
And we are here We are aliive
We have work to do
Our hymms are still to be sung
The poetry of our existence is not yet completed
We will BLEED our tragedy all over your ignorance
Because she is me
And I am her
And we will MAKE you remember!

This poem is about: 
Me
My community
Our world

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