Black History Month

Brown Girls can do ballet!

I scream to students

That don't understand,

what it is like

When your life depends on the color and shade of your hands

I dance in the living room,

thinking of Change

my brown skin glowing at the center of the stage

At the age of ten,

I take out the shiny pink shoes

And waltz on the floor

Like I have nothing to lose

Brown girls can do ballet,

I said to myself

For I have dealt with worse

I move my brown body through the floor

wanting to move even more and more

Move away from the racism,

dance away from the pain

Think of flying in the light rain,

I jump,

I turn

trying to burn

The world's way of thinking

for a better place

In the theater

I sit up from the crowd

when somebody like me,

Could see my dream.

On stage, he comes and dances with her too.

They float together like a bird of a feather

They join and do a jump

A turn and stay in front

Brown girls do ballet.

And I will do my passé

Pas de chat

Step of the cat,

can you do that?

I move across the room thinking of the dancer

I want to be soon.

Maybe they won't take me,

but they can not

Break me