If We Were Blind

If we were blind

would you still put me in chains?

Would you tie my hands

like my mother did my braids?

If we were blind

night would be our day.

Colored

would never be my name.

Freedom would’ve never been a right.

A mockingbird would’ve never had to die.

Everything is beautiful.

To touch

my curls swirling up.

To feel

Grandma’s sweet potatoes melt into blood.

A textured love.

Yet, here I step in your grainy hate.

From my toes to my hair

washed up from thousands of years.

Scrapping away what our mother bestowed upon me.

Wishing this water was not my ancestors’ sea.

Here, I’m a slave to those who save the day.

Those who still wait 

to throw me away.

Here, we claim colorblind, but never blind.

Chained to cursed sight.

Concealing the brownest eye.