I AM four years old

and my mother is zipping my coat up with feverish fingers

and a red-lipped smile

i look out into the sheeting rain and

instinctively, i reach for my hood

“no,” she says, her hands stopping me

“but-“

“carry your umbrella instead, okay?’

i do not understand.

 

I AM five years old

my fingers catch on a cowboy costume

and immediately i feel a smile

light up on my lips

“this one, mommy!”

my mother does not return my smile 

instead she purses her lips 

and says,”what about a princess?”

“no,” i say, feeling tears well up in my eyes

“i want to be a cowboy.”

my mother smiles a watery smile

“you know you can’t carry a toy gun around, baby.”

i do not understand.

 

I AM ten years old

and it’s friday

and it’s twelve pm

and i have always thought  my skin was beautiful

the way it looks beside autumn leaves and fresh-fallen snow

but as he looks at me across the blacktop

i feel an ugliness slithering up my neck like a wet-scaled snake

“you’re black,” he states matter-of-factly

“yeah, so?” i mumble

“you can be the robber. my mom says black people are robbers.”

i find a blue box, locked to the top, trapped by the checkers on the floors and ceilings and i hide within its crevices and i feel that ugliness slithering up my neck again and i cry harder than i did when grandpa was arrested and i wonder if the boy is right if i’m a robber by nature and i do not leave the bathroom until a shrill blaring sets me free.

but am i free?

i understand.

 

I AM eleven years old

and experimenting

and i feel beautiful again

and my friend elizabeth tells me my eyeshadow doesn’t look good on black girls

and i cry harder than i have since elementary school

and i run to my mother’s room after school and lash out at her vanity

and i ask her makeup, i plea to it to give me some form of solace, i beg it to like me. i promise it i will treat it well. i slather myself in mascara and lipstick and blush, but elizabeth is right, it looks all wrong and i hate my skin and i hate how i look and i hate that the boys at school tell me black girls aren’t pretty and i want to break the glass, to shatter it, to drag the crystsalline shards down my skin, to destroy my identity, but my mother finds me and collapses and we cry together for a long time. 

i understand.

 

I AM twelve years old

and i am used to being the exotic one

i am used to their fingers crowding my scalp

combing through my braids

and asking me how i wash it

i am used to the boys who are drawn to white girls like

moths to a flame

but repelled by pigmentation of my own skin 

i am used to being picked last 

and i am used to them telling me to go back to africa

and when the school receives a new black boy

they look at him like a trophy

or the head of some animal, mounted above their mantel

and they tell me we’re perfect for each other

that we correspond like his and her sinks, the kind my mother cannot afford by theory, and they tell me our skin matches, like paint swatches plucked from the same shelf, and they tell me to kiss him, kiss him on the lips, you’ll marry the big and have little robber babies with him, and they ask me if we’re related, the only black kids in a school swimming with pretty pale porcelain people

and when i go home and scream

my mother tells me

“not all white people, tamara, baby.”

and i do not understand.

 

I AM fourteen years old

and walking down the street

and i am happy

i am weightless, carried by the wind

and i am colliding with something

someone

and i fall

and the earth resettles itself

and i hear the words

“watch it, nigg**.”

and i see my smile fall off my face

and slowly roll into the street

i watch cars run it over until it’s little more than a frown

bloodied by the blush draining from my face 

but hey, you wouldn’t be able to tell if i was blushing anyway

and i do not understand and the next time i hear a white girl spit that godforsaken word at me my instincts and reflexes all come pouring to the surface, like a sandglass turned upside down and i watch myself grab her and shake her and toss her to the ground and i am hitting her and they are roaring like a tsunami, swallowing me, changing me, turning me into their stereotype and after my suspension is over they tell me i’m ratchet and i have hands from the hood and they ask me if my dad was in a gang and

i understand.

 

I AM fifteen years old

and my hand is linked with my baby brother’s

and he is barely about to hit third grade

and he still wears spiderman underwear

and he’s the most beautiful thing 

and his skin is lovelier than any i’ve ever seen

and i am buoyant

and we bag up our groceries

and head out the door

and that’s when i see

an unpaid-for plastic pistol

situated under his forearm

and the pair of police officers 

loitering outside the store

and i hear myself hiss, “marcus!”

and i feel a fear rise up in me like oncoming vomit and i feel like my mother ten years past, telling little tamara a princess costume is favorable over a cowboy costume because of the accessories it comes with and i’m ripping the toy from his hand and i’m stuffing it in my purse and i’m shaking and the officers have their eyes pointed at me and i feel targeted and i feel threatened and i fell violent anxiety and i hear my mother say,

“not all white people, tamara, baby.”

“not all cops,” i think to myself.

i smile and collect my brother and head for the car.

i understand.

 

I AM eighteen years old

and he makes me feel pretty

this boy

and this is the first time we’ve gone out

and we’re sat surrounded by coffee and croissants

and he’s smiling and laughing

and firing questions at me like there’s no start 

and no beginning

and then he asks me

“where did you apply?”

and i say, “actually, i already got accepted at berkley.”

and he smiles like he’s a proud father

and he says, “that’s so good! especially considering you’re…”

my mouth sets and i can predict his next words like they’re already being launched at me and my body turns rigid and i feel white hot anger encroach on my body and i’m back to being an exotic thing, likened to a zoo animal who rarely survives is captivity at least that’s what it feels like it feels like he’s predetermined who i am based on the exterior color coating of my skin and

i understand.

i leave the coffee shop.

 

I AM twenty-three years old

and i am used to the racism

and the shock that comes with my life story

and i am used to the jokes about my dietary habits

(watermelon, chicken, corn…)

i am laughing along to the joke they throw at me

and i am feeding the stereotype

and i am sitting at a house party and i crack a self-deprecating joke about the color of my skin and suddenly the room has erupted and there are jokes being thrown every which way and they are all aimed at me and i’ve started this, i’ve fed it and it’s growing and i feel worse than i have in a long time

and i understand.

 

I AM  twenty-six years old

and i am a single mother

working class

living in a two story house

and i’ve stopped with the jokes

and i’ve told my daughter

her skin is beautiful 

and to be cherished

and every time she brushes her teeth 

she looks into the mirror attached to the medicine cabinet

and grins a sloppy, goofy grin

one of missing teeth

and full lips

and murmurs, “beautiful.”

and i understand.

i understand so well.

 

I AM twenty-nine years old 

and i am vacuuming the living room

and my daughter is giggling

every time i pretend to suck up her feet

and the news is on

and it’s talking about a black boy who has just been murdered

and i’m laughing with amelia 

(that’s her name)

and i hear my phone ring

and i pick it up as my latest laugh hits the air

and there’s a broken sobbing on the other end of the line

and i freeze

and my blood runs cold as ice and amelia’s face goes blank and i stand there, quivering, thinking maybe this is a joke, a funny prank call or something and so i stand there for a second letting the crying wash over me like torrential rain and i wait and i wait and i wait and

“marcus.”

i do not understand.

 

I AM thirty-years old

standing over my baby brother’s broken grave

the soles of my feet sending a clap of thunder

down towards his coffin

and amelia is standing at my side

and i’m crying

and wishing something could change

and amelia is latching onto my leg

and i’m saying, “yes all cops.”

and she’s saying, “mommy, do they not think my skin is beautiful?”

and i’m saying, “no, no they don’t, amelia.”

she understands.

— I AM BLACK