It's
the last few days of black history month. All month I have been
thinking about what the women before me have had to go through to make
my life, my motherhood, who I am today possible.
To be made to work without compensation, to be raped of dignity, to have your children taken from you and sold, to make meals for your family with scraps, to make a warm bed on the floor, to see your son murdered for dreaming of escape, to see your husband killed for having a dream. It is amazing that black mothers are still here. It's astonishing that they still love. It's beautiful that they still are able to nurture. They may not have given us a perfect life. But they gave us the best considering the baggage that they inherited from generations past. We now know better and can do better. I love the poem below by a mother that has endured a lot of hardship herself and still rose. Happy Black History Month Mommas!
To be made to work without compensation, to be raped of dignity, to have your children taken from you and sold, to make meals for your family with scraps, to make a warm bed on the floor, to see your son murdered for dreaming of escape, to see your husband killed for having a dream. It is amazing that black mothers are still here. It's astonishing that they still love. It's beautiful that they still are able to nurture. They may not have given us a perfect life. But they gave us the best considering the baggage that they inherited from generations past. We now know better and can do better. I love the poem below by a mother that has endured a lot of hardship herself and still rose. Happy Black History Month Mommas!
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.
Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.
Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.
Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.
Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
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