Colors

After a day-long discussion on race, we were asked to find a partner and write a dialogue-poem that would describe our feelings through the day at Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity (SEED).

Under the influence of Jazz and our laidback-ness, Bornunderstanding Allah, my friend from SEED, and I came up with our super short, quick, humorous-but-intense piece, “Colors”. Now, if you can’t locate either the humor or the intensity or both, you are missing the point. And you are not to be blamed. After all, race has not remained obvious and many people do miss the point, more often than not, in conversations around it. So here it goes!

Twenty Six years,
I have been a person of color.

Twenty Six hours,
I have been a person of color.

My car is white,
My T-shirt is red.
The thought of color and identity
Never came to my head.

Pink is my T-shirt,
Blue is my jeans.
Red is for some anger,
White for some peace.

Black is my color,
When I’m stripped naked.

Brown is my color,
When I’m stripped naked.

If we have all the colors,
What do you have?

Inspired by the poem coloured.