Don’t mind me- I’m just scrapping
I’m tryin to see what color my soul is-tryin to figurte out if it’s the same as this chocolate epidermis
Tryin to see if its as black and scarred and burned and strong
Tryin to see if my heart still calls out to her- my birth mother- Africa
Because my feet aren’t stompin like hers
My hands arent clappin like her
My tongue doesn’t move like her…
I’ve been ashamed to call out her name- my mother’s name
Even though its obvious on the outside that my foster mother –america and I share no resemblance.
Her blue eyes and blond hair are taunting me as I sit here scrapping myself raw-
Daring me to find what she had hidden from me so long ago
So I was embarassed to even admit that I missed my mother, that even though I had never seen her with my own eyes I had felt her in my soul…
I guess I was worried that I’d be a dissapointment-
I was taken from her so I could be worse off than she ever was
But I was made to be better like my royal ancestters before me with their ebony skin and long swan necks with sparkling white teeth enclosed by black licorice gums
I’d heard some stories about her from my parents but their memories were foggy from the distant memories of their parents before them.
And even though my foster mother would hate me for thinking of you I do-
All the time and I just wanted you to know that I realize- I understand now- that you wanted to keep me but you had lost the battle- heck you lost the war.
My foster mother thinks that you are weak and that I would be nothing if I was still back home with youshe thinks I’m selfish for not appreciating everything she gave me
But I do…
I just want to find you again
I hust want to puncture my chest and expose my insides-
I want you and your beautiful blackness tho flood into this tempmorary home of mine
I want to cut my arms open and let my black blood pour out of my veins breathing in the fresh air
Finding the oxygen it was dying without
I just want to know where you are mom
I just need to find you before I can be complete.
I can’t find anyone else who will tell me about you “back in the good ol’ days”
I just need to know if its okay if I want to learn the languages that you have inspiored, to read the proverbs that your mysterious beauty has made known
I just need to know that its okay if I refuse to speak the dialect of my burgouise neighbors
That its okay if I still think that I am royalty through you
That no matter how long I stay here I your name will always be tatooed on my heart
That it will never fade away
I just need to know that your hair is as wooly and black as mine
That our slanty eyes blink together
That when I cry you cry in rememberence on me in April- on my birthday
That when I try to dance and my plastic jewelry is clinking away
That your gold, diamond, ruby, sapphire, and emerald adornments dance along your wrists, ankles, neck. Through your nose, lips, and ears. Clinking to the same heartbeat as mine.
And if all that is true then there si no point in carrying on with my self-inflicted mutilation of self discovery
You have shown yourself to me in every way that matters.
That when I breathe, when I pray, when I talk, when I cry, when I laugh, when I dream when I fall and when I rise –
You- my mom- Africa will be traveling along with me all the way home