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To be black in a white world
The price of being black In a white world
Is the cost some of us can't afford
A currency we don't own
Not because we don't have affluence
But because they stole the wealth that inhabits our land
The price of being black In a white world
Is the unreachable expectation of measuring up to something we will never be - white
It's our vulnerability, our moments of calm
Where you leap from the shadows And take advantage
Where you silence our screams
Whilst we beg and plead
It's being neither heard nor seen
The price of being black In a white world
Is being gaslit until we choke
On the invisibility of not being understood
Of trying to cloak our blackness
Through erasure of our history
By trying to scrub away our identity
Whilst silencing our ancestry
Trying to remove any evidence of our being
With centuries of prolonged genocide
The price of being black In a white world
Is having no control over people perceptions of you
Facing judgment as soon as you enter a room
Used to being stared at like we're alien
Being followed without good reason
Treated as if we are scum
Being black In a white world
Is to always feel like you don't belong
The price of being black In a white world
Is to be friends with sorrow
To not know the outcome of tomorrow
To always be on the phone
With the ones you love the most
Not knowing if this is your last conversation
Fearing the possibility of a life alone
The fear of another funeral
To be black in a white world
Is to treasure every moment not knowing if this is the last one
To be black in a white world
Is to have a strength most don't
Is to have a heart of gold
In a world that has treated us so very cold
To be black in a white world
Is to live in a world that has stole hope
Copyright ©
Layla Riley-Hill
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