Brown in the Sun

I walk with a heavy load. Sugar cane sticks loaded on my back.

My knees buckle with ache. I fall into a haze. A memory slowly rises from the heat of the sun.

I looked down at my skin, the color of cinnamon sticks.

Fresh breezes whipped around me, the smell of saltwater in the air. I was almost in paradise, white beaches and topaz waters near.

More money, more love, more status would be there. I arrived here on a ship. The Hesperus it was called.

No white beaches or Topaz waters were there.

It was a land full of sugar cane, coconuts and masters. Never had I seen so many white faces and whips.

In the scorching yellow sun till the black of night, blue eyes kept watch.

Virgins, mothers and daughters, blue eyes climbed on top. Sita, Lakshmi –goddesses save me.

The golden life sold to a brown girl like me, turned black in the trenches of human servitude.

I crossed the Indian ocean in search of the sun, instead found the evils in souls of men crossing the Caribbean Sea.

Caged birds in sugar estates were freer than me.

A bound coolie (indentured servant) is all I was to be.

Why did this happen to me?

Being brown in the sun is what got me here.

I was working outside the day his blue eyes approached me. He told me to sign. I couldn’t read or write.

Why did I get on the ship? I wish I could die.

I looked down at my skin, once the color of cinnamon sticks. It’s now mahogany, beat by the sun.

Clear drops trickle down my face. A voice whispers. I love you, my mother said as I left for the ship.

She used to tell me I was beautiful. I would say I’m too dark. You are brown and brown glistens in the sun.

An angry voice breaks my thoughts. “You there!” I jump up. It’s time to get back to “work.”