So this dumbass asked me the other day
“Why does Black History Month always have to be about
Death and Rosa Parks and Malcolm X and MLK?
Why can’t y’all get over it and just find some happy shit to say?”
I had to summon the sarcasm of seventy generations
To say:
Oh I’m sorry
Sorry my history is about as convenient for you
As it is for me
Sorry our blood ain’t blue enough for you
When you spill it in the streets
But come on, Captain Dumbass
Struggle ain’t ever been your fashion
I mean
Has anyone ever shat on your passion
The way you just ejaculated you privilege over entire generations
Of people whose backs your ancestors grew up on?
Hm?
So you ask me, Doctor Dumbass
Why Black History Month is so repetitive
Why we regurgitate the same Negro spirituals
And slave narratives
Instead of finding more stuff
That’s positive to talk about
Why you always gotta hear us run our mouths about
Black lives mattering
“Cause no offense, sis, it gets kinda tiring”
And I gotta ask you in return
If you don’t think we find it tiring
To watch our world burn
To keep hearts like yours that superficial kinda warm
You like to wrap up in blanket statements like
“I don’t even see colour”
If you don’t think we find it tiring
To be hated by so many for so long
After doing nothing wrong
That we begin to hate each other and ourselves
Because if you think someone could forget
What that kinda oppression feels like
You’re even more ignorant than I gave you credit for
And as for why Black History Month repeats
It’s because racism, supremacy and white privilege are a disease
That has killed more black people since slavery than COVID-19
And damn right, we angry about that shit
I mean, I could be quieter
About nine-minute knees in our necks
And just talk about happier shit...
I could just be grateful that black people
Are finally moving up in a world
That refuses to understand them
But ain’t that what modern massas want us to do?
Take every small victory as a consolation prize
And pretend it’s reparation?
Act like we ain’t in last place in the human race?
Excuse the crimes against humanity
And let you off the hook easy
While you overlook the millions of melanin mouths
You continue to silence
By determining lower-class citizenship
Based on our pigment?
I bet, Señor Dumbass, that now you feel offended
Because in your mind I just launched an attack on you
For something that your ancestors did
And it ain’t necessary, “Calm down, sis
We can’t change the past”
Like you ain’t still the one that benefits
Like white skin ever made you afraid to wake up
Or go outside
Or exist
Like you ever had to say your prayers like:
“If I should die before I wake
I pray the Lord my soul to take
If I should wake up and then die
I pray my soul to heaven flies”
Ya know, General Dumbass, I gotta ask
How come you so defensive now?
I only gave you logic sharp as a whipcrack
Bursting through your eardrums
Like the sound of breaking backs
Massa would be proud, no?
Or should I apologize for generalizing your entire race?
For your wounded ego?
For your wailing conscience?
I gotta know
Should I just look you dead in your history
Right in your existence and go:
Fam, why you mad, though?
