Thank You!

Thank You!

Thanks for making me and

every other brown kid feel unwanted

Thanks for blaming the source

of your problems on our skin color

Thanks for teasing us about our skin color just to

tan your own

Thanks for labeling our culture as ghetto

Thanks for making me feel alone,

In a building full of 1,000 people

Thanks for calling me the angry black girl

But once you find out I’m latina...saying it was

just my sassy latina attitude

Thanks for calling our culture ratchet

But once you apropriate it, it’s bold... it’s different

Thanks for telling me to go back to my country

Even though, I was born here

Thanks for assuming things about me

only after seeing the color of my skin

Thanks for the funny jokes about

Cotton, illegal immigration, or drugs and gangs

Thanks for telling me I’d look better if

My hair looked like everyone elses

Thanks for constantly touching my hair like you’re in a museum

because I’m sure you would love it if people grabbed your hair without asking

Thanks for telling me I’m pretty...

For a black girl

Thanks for making every history class, and every

english class feel like I need to be on high alert

Thanks for not acknowledging me by my name

But calling me “the black girl”

But thanks, because now I know to be thankful for, other brown kids, for my skin color, for my hair and for my culture.