The colour Brown

Brown is not a colour that many would think to be beautiful,

synonymous with mud and dirt, not exactly the picture-perfect colour of effervescent beauty.

But brown is a colour that speaks volumes,

a reminder of centuries of genocide and hate that the world would rather be swept aside.

A symbol of glory and triumph over those that would try to destroy it.

Brown is strength and power, love and wisdom,

a cascading prism of blossoming flowers.

Brown is loud, a voice that echoes, screams back and will not be drowned.

A colour that radiates hope and liberation like the sun.

Brown is the colour of my skin,

a colour I tried to ignore my whole life because the world taught me that brown was not a colour I wanted to be.

But they were wrong.

The complexity that is my complexion is vast and cannot be simplified.

My skin is the essence of honey and gold, of more beauty than has ever been known,

skin that tells stories, screams a past and calls to a future.

Skin that gleams, flickers, and burns,

gilded in gold and pearls,

infused with melanin,

bathed in chocolate elegance.

Blessed with the melanin that dances through my skin,

enhances the galaxy within.

Brown skin that sings beautiful melodies with the birds and hums with the east wind.

Brown skin that dances in the sunlight, casts spells with the moon and drifts away with the stars.

Skin that is deep, rich, and unwavering in its beauty,

sun kissed skin echoing that of goddesses and queens.

Brown is the colour of my eyes,

eyes that see the whitewashed history we are taught,

crocked ignorance stamped into the minds of the young.

Brown eyes that see the history of the past crashing to the shore with the waves,

riding them like the horsemen to the apocalypse.

Brown eyes that see people pay thousands to look like me,

when my melanin came free.

It came free with the names, the stares, the whispers, and the hate.

But now, you see, my melanin is the fuel to my fire,

the gas that lights my self-esteem and drives my desire,

making sure that I see myself as nothing less than a queen.

Brown is the colour of my hair,

pulled, prodded, twisted and mocked,

hair that I tried to flatten and mould to a standard it could not hold.

Brown hair that curled into ringlets of gold shining as they bounced.

A curl pattern that defies every ounce of logic,

but that was rooted in the same hypnotic curves as my body.

Brown hair that I had to learn to tame,

while those around me proclaim that my mane was too much work.

Brown hair that is laced with history,

some that is still a mystery to me,

but that does not come from my complicity but the worlds mis telling of my lineage.

Brown hair that defies gravity, engulfed universes and hid my secrets.

Brown hair that beams and glows with its own unmatched uniqueness.

Brown is me,

melanin skin that will never demand the worlds acceptance,

and instead exist in its own magical beauty despite the colours trying wash it out.

Melanin skin that will not ask to be pardoned,

you are the one perplexed by my darkness.

Encased in my skeleton, melanin filled to the brim,

overspilled with a gift, enchanting and bewitching in formula,

siren calling skin synonymous with seduction.

But Brown has been plagued with labels,

that have remained over decades and centuries,

not simply washed away with the 'new age',

but rather fuelled and enraged by the incessant hate attached with these names.

Brown that will stain,

mark this earth so permanently that brown will never be whitewashed away.