Black and White Mixes to Make Grey, Not Brown

What are you?

You are confused.

You cannot place me into one of your neatly packaged, socially constructed classifications.

You are bothered.

Your mind demands order and structure.

Within that space, there is not room for this kind of ambiguity.

You are curious.

You have already formed your assumptions, but you are seeking answers.

You want to ask, but are trying to balance your urge for clarity with political-correctness.

You need me to explain myself- rather, my skin tone-in order for you to move forward.

What are you?

I am confused.

Less by the question itself and more by the fact that you find the need to ask it at all.

I am calculated.

I consider responding with human.

Knowing fully that this is not the answer you are looking for and enjoying it specifically for that reason.

I am annoyed.

It is not about where I come from, but about what label I fit best under.

Knowing my identify allows you to access the appropriate biases you have stored in your mind.

It gives you permission-or rather justification- for how you chose to interact with me.

What are you?

I am biracial.

I am both Black and White, but exist entirely outside of both groups,

Somewhere in the in-between.

Here I am just able to reach out and touch both boundaries at the same time, but unable to penetrate either.

Belonging only to the grey area.

I am brown.

I am more than a color, but fit best in this vagueness.

At least here I look like them and they look like me.

But similar levels of melanin does not guarantee shared struggles with otherness.

Surrounded by a million faces, I am still alone.

I am searching.

To be Black enough.

To be White enough.

To be enough.

What am I?

I am translucent.

My experiences wash out in the ever-expanding sea of Brown,

Fading into the white noise,

Undiscernible to those just passing by.

I am the sum of all of my parts,

The product of every challenge I have overcome.

I am both whole and broken,

Just waiting to been seen.

But as long as you see nothing but color,

You will never truly see me.