Before you start judging me, let me say that I was tired. 

Tired of people asking me what I wanted to be when I grew up, and wanting to say alive. 

Tired of society putting a noose around my neck instead of a pearl necklace.

Tired of being a cocoa puff in a bowl of cheerios where nobody likes chocolate milk. 

Who doesn’t like chocolate milk?

Tired of turning on the TV, and never seeing any cartoon little girls that looked like me.

They only want to see us succeed with a ball in hand, mic to mouth, or shackles on our feet.

Oh, or those weekly specials that CNN rolls out every week!

You know what I mean… 

The one where they would shoot the little brown boys, for stealing a piece of candy?

To you, they were episodes, to me it was my destiny.

From Trayvon Martin to Tamir Rice, 

George Floyd or The Charelston 9

Their stories’ were ended in the blink of an eye.

So I can’t breath, I can’t eat, I can’t sleep in peace. 

And God forbid I try to go to church with my family! 

You know what, thanks, but no thanks. I think I’m all set.

And that was the day I started my quest. 

My quest to become white.

My quest to become right.

My quest to become pretty and all things nice.

So I chemically tamed my mane that defied gravity and grew towards the sun,

into a lifeless ponytail, allowing my fingers to run

I put bleach and Lysol to my skin,

hoping to rub off the blackness and maybe one day fit in

Perfect…. at least so I thought.

But the byproduct I got was not what I sought.

My heart began to beat to the tune of a black girl’s blues;

using suburban articulation to mask my melanated hues.

I became a prisoner of a body that betrayed me

enslaved me, and rewrote my fairy-tale as the Beast never Beauty. 

I was the token black girl. Their prized possession.

The honorary “ black friend” to stop any questions.

But still. never. accepted. 

For, I am only white when I am celebrated,

but still black when I am appropriated.

White when I use words like perfunctory and dilapidated. 

Too white to be black and too black to be white.

And too much of Edna to ever be right. 

But we must recognize that one cannot be right if they were never wrong

I had to become my own writer, change the tune of my song

So yes, my journey to become white approached a dead end

But my confidence began to transcend any barrier I had ever set

The sky was no longer the limit, the clouds were my playground

I had been set free from the shackles of hatred to which I was bound

I realized I was a chocolaty masterpiece, God’s beautiful creation

Strong and Educated. The reality of my ancestors' imagination.