I wouldn't change being black

Let me make this clear

My blackness is so important, and I won’t ever think that it’s not

I don’t consider my ethnicity to be ordinary because nothing about it is ordinary.

I understand that who I am is what others desire to be.

And they can’t imitate what they don’t appreciate.

I’ve been told that my hair looks coarse, nappy and rough

But I can’t ever remember giving acknowledgement to those simply uneducated.

What I was born with will never be considered a problem to me,

Instead, it’s what makes up my identity.

My afro defies gravity and can take up as much space as it desires.

Its presence graces the atmosphere with its cocoa and shea butter scent

it’s soft like sheep’s wool and can be manipulated into different styles so that I can be a different person every week.

That pigment though….

Where do I even start?

I was dipped like a brush into a bucket of paint filled with melanin

It can only be adored

Even the sun shows its admiration when it brushes its lips on my browned sugar mixed with gold and a little warmed mocha skin.

I can’t help but flex this complexion.

I have lips that are full and glazed over with gloss

They even glisten when in the dark.

I have eyes that are onyx that don’t reveal their russet brown undertone.

How else can that not seem like magic?

My appearance is powerful,

I’m unapologetic for thinking so.

I’m proud to be black

I’m black all day and every day,

And being black is all pervading.

I’m a dangerous threat

Perhaps even lethal if you think about it.

I am more than just a societal standard and will never confine to those morals.

I will never underestimate my potential.

Closemindedness will hinder me from my success

I will always be mine before I will ever be anyone else’s.

I will always put myself first.

I deserve to feel this happiness.