They Look at Me Crazy

White people 

Look At me crazy 

When I open my mouth they are amazed at the way my tongue transforms into Picasso and paints a masterpiece of my future

 How my eyes open wide like the gates of heaven when I think about college 

How my heartbeat begins to sound like African drums when I think about moon walking across my future college grounds

How my knees begin to buckle when I think about sashaying across the graduation stage in my 4-inch heels as I look to the sky and whisper to my father I did as my he hangs around my neck engraved in gold 

They look at me crazy 

Because I am from a city that expresses itself through homicides 

Where more flowers are placed on graves than given to mothers by her sons on Mother’s Day  

I am from a city where it’s hard to tell if the clouds are black because of gun smoke, chevron or if the sun just wanted hide behind the clouds for the day

 A city where men drop out of school to flip bricks, experiment with baking soda, lay in hospital beds because they consumed to much Bo, and can’t wander to certain parts of town because it’s like walking into a death trap

A city where girls constantly get told that what’s between their legs can keep them from going broke and hungry, where they get pregnant like clockwork, transformed into single mothers at 15, working a minimum wage job spending more time at the club looking for a father figure, oops I mean a baller, rather than embracing there seeds

They look at me crazy 

When I tell them that I refuse to be a product of my city

That my life does not revolve around twerking on the penises of men for their own pleasure, leprechauns that only see gold between my legs and not the gold that my determination, goals and ambition are wrapped in like a Christmas present 

They look at me crazy 

When I tell them that at 18 years old my life is already mapped out 

I will not be depending on my mother for the rest of my life, stuck with 2 kids working a minim wage job, still looking for the love my biological father never gave me in each man that I come across 

I tell they will not help them up the percentages for the statistics they have on my people

I tell them 

I will not let hem be the director of my movie of success

But they can sit in the audience and watch  

As soles of my shoes l make love to the pavement of the Spelman College

Where brilliant women blossom, violet roses blooming from the garden of never ending knowledge thorns of sophistication and creativity cuts those who challenge there beauty

They look at me crazy when I tell them I plan on getting my

Bachelors in English with a minor in creative writing 

My Masters in public speaking 

And my PhD in forensic psychology 

They look at me crazy when I tell them 

When I get sick of working I will relax and write my book, “The Unspoken Words of a Hustler’s Daughter” 

For the girls who grew up with their father’s a drug dealers to show them how to heal their pain 

With poetry 

They tell me that it’s impossible; they tell me that I’m going down a path of stress, debt and suicide 

I trace back my black history and show them that people told Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Rosa Parks the same things when word got out about their plans

I tell them that I refuse to transform into sleeping beauty and lay in the box that society has already decorated for me; it looks too much like a coffin

They look at me crazy 

When I tell them I have the heart of a lion, soul of a poet, and I can do anything through God who strengthens me

I tell them that I am a black woman

And if you know nothing about us you should know that we can handle anything you throw at us 

They look at me crazy when I tell them I will 

I look at them crazy when they tell me I can’t