I've been asked if I could, would I make my skin lighter

Alter my background so that I can be whiter

What's worse is that I wouldn't hesitate

Why wouldn't I change what I've been taught to hate?

In elementary school, all that I learnt

Was that her skin looked caramel and mine looked burnt

Middle school came, it was more of the same

Teaching me nothing but to be ashamed

High school kids have even more jokes

Turn out the lights and "Hey, where did she go?"

I'd expect this from those who don't know what it's like

But it hurts even worse when it’s from your own kind

Blacks separate themselves by the color of skin

The content of their character has been lost on them

Team light skin, team brown skin, team we-don't-have-the-same-skin

Putting down others to hold up their own chins

See the hashtags on twitter, they hate one another

If you're not on the right team, then why even bother?

Red bone and yellow bone, but what about black?

I think that we lost it and we need to go back

How can we be prejudiced towards our own kind

The standards of beauty have made us all blind

All the racism and hatred we worked to defeat

Are being brought back by blacks dressed in white sheets

We offend those who committed to a dream of equality

Oppressed as we are, we don't deserve pity

Are we all not one race? Are we not all the same?

How can you divide a color based on its shade?

Look how far we've come from singing freedom songs

But now I can't even find a race where I belong

If light skin is the right skin, then I guess that I'm wrong

For bearing the color of the land that I'm from

They say the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice

But I’ve turned sour and rot from years of abuse

I try to be proud that I’m close to my roots

But if I’m being cut down, then I don’t see the use

If my skin could be lighter, what would I choose?