Since when have Black Lives Mattered?
When our precious diamonds were treasures to be stolen by filthy pirates?
When our bodies were thrown overboard?
When our hands bled from the pricks of cotton?
When our legs spread open to bear your children?
When your children were our bosses?
When your children hung from our brown nipples?
When our backs were broken and burned,
And scarred from the price tags printed?
When the chains were broken,
But the shackles lie on our ankles?
When our kinks started to deflate?
When our bodies started to float like butterflies?
When our skin became all the more lighter?
When our skin became soft and gentle, easy to break just the way you like it?
When you broke our limbs because they could not twist the way you wanted them to?
When our rebellions became wildfires - only we the fire and you held the hoses tightly in your hands?
When our brown skin became power instead of weakness?
When our silence became words,
When our words became actions,
When our actions became threats to your society?
When those threats to power were invitation to kill?
When have Black Lives Ever Mattered?
When will our breaths become just breaths instead of a bullseye?
When will our lives matter?
When will we have to stop looking over our shoulders for our murderers?
When will we matter?
When will we matter?
When will we matter?
When those fields became home again,
When we become your loyal servants as if we have a choice in the first place?
When?
Cause I promise,
There will be no more waiting.
It's ours for the taking.
YOU ARE READING
Woman.
PoetryA book of poems and feelings. A book from a girl, a rose from the concrete. A Woman growing.
