Voice

I am not just a seventeen year-old, mixed girl but a voice A voice to be heard A voice who belongs to a girl who words need to be spoken because yes, I may not love my body and yes, I may love the body of the same sex but God damn it, that does not change me It does not change the type of person I am meant to be Biology will be my future and I will not be held back by fifty-year old men who think they understand what it is like to be me It took Mississippi 160 years to ratify the abolition of slavery and it has taken me seventeen years to ratify the abolition of my family not going to college Constant hypocrisies and hypothesis in my head, edging out towards the shore while the tide of hateful slurs pulls me back in “Home boys” looking at me sideways because I dab them up then enclose them with a hug “girls don't do that shit aw she must play for the same team” I am not just a seventeen year-old, mixed girl I am considered among certain cliques within my friend circle as being a “white girl” because I do not answer them when they refer to me as “their nigga” I do not answer because that is not what my ancestors fought for Because my African American people did not fight against the white folk just so that decades from then our own will refer to us and embrace each other as a term we would have cringed against in the 50s Because my Native American people were not relocated just so those who remained can exploit us through casinos Because my Mexican people went through hell and back so that their sons and daughters could have a future. And for what? So that now those same sons and daughters could recruit themselves into armies, each squadron being identified as either cholo or chola I deserve more than to just be associated with my age I may not have lived for very long but I am beyond my years Do not talk down to me just because I cannot vote yet What you fail to see is that I take my future seriously and I prefer to talk about politics rather than Justin Bieber's latest hairstyle I am a girl who likes to hang out with her friends on the weekends, do schoolwork most of the time, and crack open a good book to read Because I am not just a seventeen year-old girl