I stared in the burning pools of your eyes.
I respected the rage in your face.
You almost spit. You said 'Fuck this shit'.
As you sat down with white girls
to talk about race.
It took a lot for you not
to walk out of the place.
But you stayed, and we waded
through anger and shame.
Through passing, and privilege, and power and pain.
Humiliation, defiance, survival and blame.
And the struggle to get up and keep trying
To face the racist lying.
We heard from a girl whose mother and father
came from Norway and Iran.
'What is white?', asked she,
and I looked into me,
And thought about access
to education and land.
And I looked down and balanced the skill in my hands
against a white expectation that I could walk in a bank,
And talk Money with The Man.
Then I saw my Grandmother,
without running water, dying in childbirth
in a room behind the store.
My mom was the last child born alive
to a woman whose people are strong and sure
In a country where Racism kept her so poor.
See, despite her blue eyes, her white skin,
or her cries, her people were slaughtered
for having thoughts such as this:
'I am Irish.
I have a Right to
Exist'.
What is a racist? What is hate?
Those that seek peace must eliminate
The privilege given to those who seek to dominate.
And those who seek power might just sit down and wait
for The Silenced to speak their minds.
The back of the line is the real Front Lines.
That's where Miz Justice resides.
That's where Courage and Freedom and Truth
And Resistance have made her so wise.
That's where Dignity lives. And dies.
That's where Fortitude gets back up and tries
To fight the racist and expose the lies.
That's where it's easy to recognize
real, honest, solid, true allies.
We're deeply bound by our opened eyes.
See, deep in our brown,
and beyond our blue,
We've got that exact same look in our eyes.
May it cross every border
Without a disguise.