"What are you?"

This is the question I am asked most often when people glimpse at my curly Q curls,

Hundreds of individual rings; tightly woven circles that dangle down my neck, tangled from the front to back.

Yes, I know, it’s tempting to pull but don’t.

"What are you?”

It’s the question I am asked when they catch sight of my coffee-stained skin.

See, I’m mixed.

A mocha; 2 shots of espresso that leaves you feeling satisfied by my answer but you say there's too much creamer in me to be considered black.

When people see me they forget about my roots.

My ancestry.

 

Understand that when you tell me I've got the best of both worlds,

I live in both worlds - two worlds-

Separate places assumed to be meant for separate people, separate people who have come to believe that separation is best.

But separation is an crude creation of a human filtration system that has found it's small, pinprick holes to be clogged with people like me.

Middle ground.

Grey, if you want to keep color coding words.

But I was color scheme created by those who had drawn outside the lines,

scribbles of red, green, blue, purple, black, white;

All melding together into a painting people have yet to see the beauty in.

Van Gogh's death may have  brought with him acceptance and understanding of his work ,

but I do not think that my death should be the start to the acceptance of who I am.

I am both the slave and master.

I whipped and I bled.

I denied and I begged.

I hated and I loved to hate.

I am fighting a war within myself, blood unwilling to spill because I'd be a casualty on either side.