Punchlines

There were times I messed up

Times I was silent

When I should have said something like

That’s not OK

To laugh along at jokes

With punchlines about

Pakis and Kaalaas.

They smiled

Harmless banter bro

“Chor do”

But how could I let it go?

Did I not know?

The voice in my head

Was laughing at myself?

At the colour of

Ma and Baba

Who crossed oceans

To find their children

Hope?

That voice grew

Louder and stronger every day

Fed by the illness in my brain

And it made me do things to myself

To fit in

To belong

To accept and move on,

Scars that will always remain

Beneath the melanin and my pain,

Do you see it now?

Like a virus,

Crawling in the minds

Of oppressors and bullies,

In the silence of the apathetic

In the hearts of those who learn to cope

By laughing along with a joke

Till a white knee is

Pressed down on a

Black neck —

Then cities burn

And fires rise

And the whole world screams

I can’t breathe