Black Thoughts

Strong women

Black mans bleeding dry hands

Angry black women

Deadbeat man 

Beyond the moment of understanding I’ve come to know

What my label will be regardless to what I show

Each day I dip my toe into this dreadful fertile dirt

My skin grows darker as I grow closer to the blood of my ancestors 

Pourn from continent to continent my mind was born angry, born strong, labeled dead 

See I have a history beyond my first breath

I'm a black woman 

I will always be a black woman like my mother and her mother and the mothers before her

It's in my blood to run with two broken feet

See through blood stained glass

Survive and call it a life of happiness

Be elated at the thought of possibly getting a crumb of that apple pie on the window seal 

Most people are familiar with positive reinforcement 

But have you ever heard of Operant training 

As a society we are made to believe that once we have done something correctly we are entitled to a reward… a promotion, a certificate that tells someone that people think you're smart, money, validation

When I was seven I saw my best friend Karen get a green sticker for helping the custodian Mrs.Ruth rake up leaves

Every day Id rake leaves hoping for a green sticker too 

After awhile I noticed Mrs.Ruth was being told to do other maintenance type tasks but the little rake she brought from home would always be there on the gate ready for me 

I never got a sticker 

I started drafting my resume the other day and I sat there for an hour staring at the first line 

Hello! My name is Hajar Mohammed

Another 45 minutes passed 

I saved the document titled "May Mcdonald's Resume"

See to Karen's one act of work ethic I had to do five and still be scratching the surface 

I wake up every morning to the dried blood on the glass ceiling that is as transparent as it is suffocating 

There is no positive reinforcement for my blood 

See operant training is the act of starving an animal until it has done what you desire for it to do 

For the sake of my blood before my breath I will consider this training my own 

Each day I am trained to believe that what I do is not enough 

Each day I am trained to do beyond what is asked to merely breath

Each day I am made submissive to ideas of someone else's circus 

My blood is thick and dry My mind is full

Once before my purpose lied in the fruits of life 

Now all I see is is another sub step before I've begun to crawl 

My blood has starved centuries

My blood picks up the dust of this world not mine 

I create life from resources of nothing 

My blood drips when dry 

My mind is at it's fullest capacity

My fruit rots in the streets and I continue to birth kings that fear only God

Each time I lift my toe from this dry dreadful dirt I scream for the fruits buried beneath it

With every word they tell me to be  quite

I can not talk, I can not See, I can not Breath

So I will close my mouth and as I close my teeth, hands and feet will dig into this blood stained red clay 

I will dig without rest I will find my foundation

I will build from the nothing and make new a better from what was robbed 

I don’t need to speak my presence is enough 

My blood is thick you can not see through me and you know it 

You see tired in my eye from months without rest

Do I look okay to you

I know I do because my skin doesn't crack 

My hair doesn't drop

And as much as I am made to shut up my lips remain full

My blood blossoms from struggle 

I'm a black woman strong black woman angry black woman

Like my mother and the mothers before her

Watch me crawl watch me dig 

Watch me plant trees of fruit in your street

Heaven lies at my success and defeat

ask me if I've slept next week

Your sorry attempt at stopping my blood is meek and weak

So pardon me if my smile doesn’t leak 

But I’ve got centuries of blood to raise before next week