The Hottest Tears

I am used to being in spaces that need me but do not want me. I am used to being in spaces that need me but do not want me. I am used to being in spaces that need me but do not want me.

My hottest tears come when I feel pain, grief, impotence, and rage all at once.

It’s not possible to have poured more love and affection into an unresponsive golem than Black Americans have poured into these United States. Over and over, we get the message that we are needed but not wanted. Needed, not wanted. Needed, not wanted. Our personhood is reduced to grist for the mill of non-Black happiness. We hold onto the sizzling coal of our anger, letting it burn our palms, so it doesn’t scald anyone else. We know intimately the intersections of love, restraint, and fury. We know it in our genes, we know it in our lived experiences, and we know it in the constant reception of violence.

Wait.

Wait.

Wait.

Wait to be as the Universe intended us to be. Wait for the freedom that is our birthright. Wait to pursue “happiness.”

“The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” If I see this Martin Luther King quote misused one more time, I might set something on fire myself. Who the hell is going to step on the slope?

We have been, unrelentingly, for over 400 years. Our feet hurt.

The people indigenous to Western Europe have wrought a level of havoc no other indigenous group has. It is time for them to bend the pernicious, perverted slope they shifted the world toward.

Sugary philosophy does its best to cover up bitter truth.

Here is the truth: we are exhausted, and it’s time for everyone else to fight for us. It is time for us to hear and see that we are seen, loved, and wanted.

All of the colonial powers owe us a debt. The neocolonial power that is the United States owes us a debt.

How low is the low that makes going high unacceptable?

We are constantly seeking, finding, and shining our own light on ourselves, nourishing our minds, hearts, and bodies with whatever we can wrench from the universe. Help us.

Asking for help does not mean we are weak — we are far from it. Every time we take a step on this stolen land, we should all remember this. We are power. We are the power. We are the tastemakers. We are most of what gives this country its je ne sais quoi and its treasured dominance.

Help us.

Show us that after years of pillaging from our bodies, our creations, our culture that maybe you stole some strength, too.

I am sick of hot tears.