There's a familiarity that white women have. It assumes the breadth of the room and feels like they are stroking your shoulders. The ones that touch your hair. Even spaces celebrated for their safety aren't for me. Spaces I pay for. Spaces that remind me of who I am. Spaces where a select group becomes more than a cohort. In the moment when I want to take up space, I am silent. I have shrunken back into the forgotten, the last to be called upon. Why tease me? Why attempt to center yourself so crudely? Why not just apologize without the drama? Then, I wouldn't remain in the lower rungs of the hierarchy. Your vulnerability always comes at my expense. Tears are too expensive to waste. Steaming mad and hurt tears hid behind my lower lids. I can't let you see me cry. You can't win. My humanity is on the line. My existence is only adjacent or after you.
This makes me question the group. Makes me ask if they really love James Baldwin or if his name sounds that good. Have they really read Jesmyne Ward or is she another New York Times best seller? I know, we have a way with words. Black folks whiddle them down to fine tip pens and write ourselves back into history. We are so gifted, so educated, so grand reading us is merely an introduction. My bravado is keeping me. I'm not sure if I belong.
While I find the rules good, I know that certain folks don't like discomfort. They don't want to examine. They just want to be validated. I'm scared. Again. I cannot get lost in someone else's story. I question if I can be more than another Black face. I question why I enrolled in such violence? Am I so desperate to be myself that I will let women, without agency, find a way to wield it over me? It's my degree, too. Tonight, I didn't feel like it was worth it.
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