i just found this in my blog dated 4/13/04
id forgotten all abt it & havent reread it yet cause i prolly wont post it if i do

its real long

liteskinned girls

-prologue-
i stood back and watched them babies dance
lil liteskinned girls, all of them
with almost-curly-but-not-quite kinks
did up in ball-balls and barrets
and smiles
lord how them babies gave us smiles
brighter than they skin
cause they were showin us what they had learned
of their mothers and of Africa
bells on they ankles
that used to be shackles
mouths full of ancient gospel
they barely understood

them babies danced
landin light on liteskinned feet and
parting the air with tan hands
they mamas and daddies, some lighter
some darker, they all smiled
cause they babies weren't out in the street
learnin god knows what from god knows who
they wasn't our walkin the path that landed
so many other blklives
where whitefolk expect us to be

--------

we never forget to worry bout
what blkfolk expect us to be.

we must have sumthin in us
we got brighter and browner than new pennies and
soft peanut butter cream for skin
and seas and oceans of waves rooted in our scalps
and names that aint spelled like Saffronia
but sound the same
we ain't all blk, but we still got that ass, tho
we still got that nose and them hips
and that slip in our backbones ttat make us okay
to be wanted and lusted and lovingly fetishized
eroticized beyond recognition/we just a
big blur of foreign Afrikanness
a silent burning haze of
always almost-but-not-quite blakness
we aint all blk & we think we 'all that'
sumthin must be in us
and we must be extra proud of it
the weight of big curly ponytails or
long tractless tresses aint what forces us to
strain to hold our heads high
we must think we're better
fuck that, we know we better &
we got a right to overlook you
bequeathed to us by the motherfuckers
who so graciously fucked our mothers
against their wills
so that we can continue the division
that makes us easier to conquer.

liteskinned girls got vocal cords
sometimes shaved lighter than their flesh

when we try to speak about our frustration
our voices suddenly take the cadences of rich ppl
complainin bout designer shoes
not comin in the right color
when we shout about justice and injustice
and reparations and control of blk bodies
we must be compensating for something
someone told us was missing
when we were young and dancing for Africa
with bells around our ankles
(today they mask the shackles)
and ancient gospel in our mouths
that ppl assume we can't understand
cause the curls and waves clog our ears
and cloud our eyes
(is this why we lock our hair?
to see clearer?)

whether locked or permed or
pressed or curled,
tomorrow seems destined to be filled full of nothing but
hair that dont have to be permed and nails
that dont need acryllic tips
we will get picked first to
take food from our babies mouths
to buy thousand dollar outfits and
shake our asses in somebody's video
and directly after we'll rejoin the welfare lines
we'll go to the section 8 offices
to city hall to bail out our sons and husbands or
to the city morgue to identify our sons and husbands
we'll look for African dance classes
to put our lil liteskinned babies in
in hopes of givin them a shelter of commonality
to shield them in this unsleeping storm of 'other'ness
to keep them outta the street,
learnin god knows what from god knows who
we won't want them on that path
that has put our babies right where whitefolk
expect them to be

but our own roads are strewn with
hazardous self-hatred and
too many poisoned-tipped forks
that force us to choose between ourselves
and ourselves.

----------
-epilogue-

there is somethin in us.
it is that same somethin that was put into our grandmothers
and yours
something they didn't want
and didn't ask for
and now we're all strugglin with the afterbirth
tryin to lick it from our necks and napes
not realizing that we'll be free of the past much quicker
if we forget it long enough to wash
and watch
each other's backs.