​

Silence of the Lamb.

Mom, I’m sorry,

I really messed up this time.

It’s not your fault,

Know that you raised a good child.

I just didn’t know,

Taking too long to pick a cereal was a crime.

Everything is suspicious when your skin

is the same colour as mine.

When I turned around,

All I saw was a muzzle and flashing lights.

I guess this is the end,

Hold my breath and count to ten.

I’ll never look into your eyes again.

I promised I’d be home for the weekend,

Forgive me mother I lied again.

Lump in my throat, Gun to my head,

I close my eyes again.

Out of sight, Out of mind I guess.

A speedin bullet back 2 the sunken place,

Buried under another white person breaking the internet

Making millions off selling my skin colour to look like me,

Where’s my royalty? n-e-g-u-s,

You stripped it from me and then you auctioned me.

Land of equal opportunity? to the highest bidder maybe,

Because you never stopped treating me like a commodity.

That’s why my melanin is the public enemy,

as I’m armed to the teeth with my identity.

What’s oil to your peace and my blackness to me.

Oh my friend,

Your foot on my neck to the ground,

Is longing to rest in the,

Hollow of your-

Hollow of your hand.

Mother I’m sorry I should’ve listened to you,

You asked me to be careful but I didn’t hear you.

I had these headphones on, noise cancellation too.

Cancel these voices inside my head jamming to Erykah Badu.

These voices that keep telling me to, “Shut up & dribble”

or that my history was a choice for my people.

These voices that aren’t even mine.

Just other people’s truths that I internalised.

Now you call it my insecurity,

Land of the free & subliminal slavery.

It’s like inception,

And I’m living inside a white man’s dream.

Because when I have a dream, You assassinate me.

So much for being a King.

Don’t mistake my co-operation for my loyalty,

Look I know the drill but I can’t hear you,

Another reason for you to put a bullet in me.

no sudden movements,

I’m down on my knees because you asked me to.

God forbid I did it in protest you would’ve axed me too.

Assimilated history, now I do it to my identity.

Hoping it leads us to emancipation,

I inherited the trauma but not the reparation.

Carrying the weight of these stereotypes like a beast of burden,

Oppression never ends, Master or Warden.

Oh my friend,

Your foot on my neck to the ground,

Is longing to rest in the,

Hollow of your-

Hollow of your hand.

Grandma married a white man to protect her kin,

barbecue in my backyard with recipes from Paula Deen.

Now I’m half something and my skin might be fair,

but It’s still half empty,

when I get profiled for my nappy hair

Grandma chose future over history,

I do it too I don’t blame her,

smoking cuban cigars like I’m Kramer,

Going to church every sunday,

let em know my passion for the christ

Hallelujah, Jesus is white.

Genetics say that blue eyes,

never come with black feet.

only if my identity agreed to take a backseat,

But you put it in the back of the bus in the first place,

and now you try to convince us you don’t see race.

Rosy parks for you, community centres for me.

Rehabilitation for you, probation for me.

Recreation for you, life sentence for me.

I’ve got dead presidents that represent me,

Dead presidents that represent me,

I can’t breathe.

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