I have lived for decades I have lived for years
I am the image of the African American girl and her struggle.
I am the little girl that was taken from her home in the middle of the night, put on a ship and sold in an auction like an animal.
I am the girl that was given a new name and told only to speak in English because my native language was no longer acceptable.
I am the girl who cried for night hoping to see my family again.
I am the girl that was beaten constantly only because my master’s wife thought I was too pretty.
I am the girl who only learned how to read because my master’s children thought it was a fun game to play.
I'm the girl that followed Harriet Tubman through the Underground Railroad only to be captured and put back into slavery a week after being free.
I am the girl who rejoiced when word got to me on June nineteenth that I was free and now considered a human being.
I am the girl who grew up during the Jim Crow laws; being told where I could eat, where I could sit, where I'm allowed to use the restroom and where I'm allowed to go to school.
I am the girl who mourns the death of my friend Emit Til, when two men brutally beat for a miscommunication, but because he was young and he was black he was at fault.
I am the girl who saw 4 of my friends being searched for in a pile of church bricks, just because they were in the wrong black church at the wrong time.
I am the girl who was sprayed with a water hose and bitten by police dogs just so the law would see me as an equal.
I am the girl whose family feared for my life as I attended a desegregated school.
Now in the 21st century through all these struggles I'm still a strong proud African American girl who is seeing the way the world is positively changing right in front of me.