Glory

For every black girl 

Who was told that they were ugly 

Who held their father's shame

Because he thought you'd have looser hair

Or whose mother's sat down and

Vehemently said how much

They couldn't stand you.

Because you looked too similar to what they were told to hate about themselves. 

For the infinite number of times

You saw the it girl be the other girl

And you're the black girl 

Who never gets to be the love interest in movies

Just enough to be seen but not truly exist

In the fullness of your womanhood or your humanity

For every black girl who was told

That their nose was too wide

Their lips were too big

Their skin too dark

And their voices too loud

For every black girl

Whose intelligence 

Was often mistaken as 

Arrogance

And who's curiosity was

beaten into silent submission

And for the black girls

Who thought their bodies were only 

Meant to be taken and objectified

but never protected and cherished. 

For every black girl

That felt the burn of hot combs and lye in relaxers

Blistering scalps

Hair forcefully straightened 

Or pulled back into conformity

black girl

Princess of the stars 

With high cheek bones

Made with the same scaple that carved Egyptian Pyramids

Skin richer than the fertile soil of the Congo

With eyes sparkling brighter than diamonds birthed from the womb of Angola

And hair so divine it tries to touch the heavenly realms 

Black girl, you are beautiful 

You are the happiness that God felt

When He completed his work and said that it was good 

You are the garden of Eden

Carefully and meticulously created 

But never replicated

Or extrapolated from the Creator

You are love embodied. 

Loved like water 

Loved like air that boyantly lifts butterfly wings

Black girl

Don't believe them when they say you are nothing

How can that be when blackness is the color of the universe that holds every star and nebula beyond what the eyes can see?

Don't  believe them when they say you aren't worth 5 dollars

When your beautiful soul and body are priceless and invaluable. 

Don't believe them when they say you are unlovable

Because what Mother Earth allows to exist on her planet, is good for Her. 

Daughters of the soil. 

Empresses of the golden Sun.

Take your place and lift your head unto the hills of glory.

Black girl, rise! 

You are enough.

You are divine.

You are royalty.

Breathlessness

I like him when he breathes

Because in a world where breathlessness is synonymous to pleasure

He would realize that it's actually a world that is oxygen deprived and slowly dying

When He breathes, he's alive.

When He breathes, I know that he feels pain

And he isn't numb to the wreckage of yearning souls pretending to be Free

To be free is to breathe

To be free is to offer hope. 

To realize that hurt and being alive

Is better than dying and delusion. 

Midnight oil

Sometimes nights 

Are like dark ink 

And my mind is a paper notebook.

My pen edges on a cliff 

Hanging on by a thread of words

That struggle to save me.

But I enjoy the rush.

Long journey

I swear

That long hair is a symbol of a long journey 

But heavy is the crown that is worn

When all I want is to feel light

Perhaps it's better to

Shorten my locs 

To cut every strand from the fertile scalp

That nourishes them

So that the weight of my journey 

Does not hinder my footsteps 

Intended to keep up the pace

Of a vivacious yet a hauntingly unknown path. 

Louder

Scream louder

So that the hardness of their cruelty bursts 

Into fine dust 

Make them recede like waves afraid of dry shores

Hush them with your noise

Drown them in your discontent 

Let the air molecules around you

Dance violently in tune with your rage

Let them know how unshakable 

The spirit of your ancestors are

Make the lions in you roar 

Rise up and be counted

Rise up and be heard. 

Love over Hate

It gives me another reason to

Rise every morning like the sun

Whenever I think about the

Pain that I can alleviate in somebody

Else's heart and soul

Mind and body.

Nobody can take away my will

To be a human being that chooses 

Softness instead of closed fists across cheek bones.

I'd rather kiss them.

Seeing broken shards of people

Everywhere I go hurts me beyond

What words I can write down intellectually. 

It gives me another reason to 

Give hope

Instead of despair that drowns.

I'd rather fill up a cup that is empty

Than to pour it out

barely quenching 

The thirst of a ground only wanting blood.

Love poem (Haiku)

One more love poem

To make him want to believe

In his light again