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| I just posted this because I needed a place where it was accessible. You don't have to read it.
I write to you today an 18-year-old, African American girl. Many people have told me that had I spoken to them on the phone, before they met me in person, they would not have thought that I was black. I don’t use slang. I don’t drop the g’s at the end of words. I don’t speak Ebonics: I am articulate. For these reasons, I am often not identified by my peers as black because I speak as if “I’m White.” Why can’t I be an articulate black person?
“You don’t hear people going around calling white men “articulate,” do you? They're expected to be!”
- Blog of the Undercover Black Man
Though extreme, and not exactly true, that blogger has an unfortunate point: it is often that we hear of black person in the public eye given the compliment of being “articulate.”
It is a well known fact that African Americans do not have the best reputation for being eloquent speakers, but it’s irritating to know that it is uncommon to assume that a black person can, and will, speak intelligently. I will not blame the media for convincing people that African American people are incapable of speaking proper English, but I will blame them for their unabashed broadcasting of a defamatory stereotype of the ethnic group as unintelligent, loud and rude. I could apologize for not being christened with a name like Bomblaquintavia and for not being ignorant, or “ghetto” enough to “be black.” I am not saying that this stereotype is inaccurate – hence the moniker stereotype -- but there is a minority within that population to which it cannot be applied. I suppose that I’m stuck: I can’t be white because of the color of my skin, and I can’t be black because I speak “like a white person.” There are a number of intelligent African-Americans: Barack Obama, Oprah Winifrey, Condoleeza Rice, Sidney Poitier. Are they speaking as if they are white or speaking as if they are well educated?
I challenge any person to provide me with some authoritative script or text that states to be black means you cannot speak correctly and be intelligent. Any erudite person is capable of that feat. It’s perplexing that I am being denied my own culture, by my own race and others, simply because of the way I speak or by the clothing I wear. I would think that because of our negative representation in the media and in society in general, people of my ethnicity, or any other race that is misrepresented, would be proud to see that I, as well as other youth, am progressing and attempting to eradicate such an egregious misconception. Sadly, this is not the case. Instead, we are ridiculed for attempting to be better, and that is something to worry about.
This essay has, thus far, been all about my racial identity issues, but it is about so much more than that. This kind of discrimination is far reaching, and my story is just one example. Our society today has the tendency to categorize everything within certain parameters. It is a tragedy that things just can’t be anymore. I would like to be able to listen to rock music without someone’s saying “Oh, that’s white people music” or hear someone tell my white friends that they can’t listen to rap because that’s not a white thing to do. Clothing, speaking styles, and things of the like don’t have a race. What good is coming from making these types of distinctions? It just makes room for more discrimination.
We are supposed to be making progress as a people, but it seems that we are slowly regressing into the old ways of separation and segregation. We are ignorantly striving to define race propriety in spite of the plethora of issues currently plaguing our world: ongoing war in Iraq, global warming, spousal and child abuse, and devastating poverty/famine. How are we letting something as trivial as assigning an “appropriate” ethnicity to a certain clothing line overshadow issues of greater importance? I think that it is time for us, as a people, to realize and effectively put an end to this kind of discrimination so that we can focus on what is actually crucial to making our world a better place.
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| Needs No Title [August 6, 2008]
She's crying right in front of you
But you can't see her eyes
Laying right in front of you
This is a surprise?
No. No. No. Stop. No
She sighs.
Limp. Numb. Angry.
Hurt. Terrified.
You didn't realize
The unreturned kisses?
The silence?
The Nothing when you were inside?
She gets up to leave.
You don't know why.
She's scared because you don't understand.
Alone. The morning passes by.
It's over you know.
She can't forgive you. Not yet.
Don't blame her. How could you?
It's not something she'll forget.
She still loves you.
She misses you.
She hurts, aches.
She cries.
She's still afraid
That you don't see what you did to her.
That you're really a monster.
She's broken.
Every moment that passes is a moment she dies.
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| Ode to Suicide [ May 2008] (written for an english project) I have tried.
I HAVE TRIED.
but momentary
Happiness
seems to no longer suffice.
The days
The days
The days
spent pleading for an end
Fail
to sustain me.
i'll leave little mess
to clean up
for I am far too considerate
I am far too aware of the
Burden
that i've become.
hold your tongue;
to reason is futile
It means
Nothing
to a heart that yearns to be still.
I choose to depart
because a Life lived
constantly awaiting
Meaning
isn't worth living
At All.
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| Untitled [December 6, 2008]
I loved him
Once.
Long ago when
I knew no better
But there is a fire
yet within in me
that No Other could
tame.
Urgent kindling
indescript and yearning
for the flue
that would make it feel alive
Once again.
Without a flint
or flame
Where am I to travel
than some place
Wetter?
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| Remember to Forget [October 20, 2008]
I'm asking you
not to forget what it was like
before you didn't want to remember.
Your side of the bed
Once warm feels like winter
Even in the summertime.
When the warm breeze
would remind me of your breath
against my neck when...
We saw my first constellation
at the park.
remember?
Sometimes.
If I think really hard.
I can feel your lips.
On mine.
On my breasts.
On my hips.
And then I remember
that you want me to forget.
Because painful things
remind you of a happier time
that you'd love to regret.
I did love you.
I'd still like to.
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