No Feelings

I want to be able to sleep peacefully at night without crying myself to sleep, or checking both my front and back doors multiple times to make sure they’re locked. I want to not have to quickly wipe my tears before a meeting and pretend that everything is ok after watching someone who looks like my brothercousin, my bestfriend, my father, die while begging to live and calling for his mother. For you this is about one man. For us this is about all our men. Those who hung from trees, who were lynched for looking at your fucking superior ass white women who couldn’t do a damn thing without the assistance of her black Mamie. It’s for the black kids harassed in the white suburb while walking home from school, for the black girls who are called nigger by the old white grandmother while clutching her precious fucking white granddaughter. It’s for hiding our friendships from our white colleagues who are intimidated by to many of us gathering together in one place. It’s for the mothers that kiss their child goodbye and say a prayer they’ll come home that night. It’s for the women who get pulled over by the cops and pray they “comply” and aren’t found hanging the next day in a jail cell. For the women like me who are scared to fall asleep because you could come into my home, unprovoked and kill me and not be held accountable for it. For the little cousin who wants to go to the store and we say no because if he walks out the door he may not come back again just because “they” decide his jeans, or his shirt or his hoodie makes him a thug.

I just want to feel … just not any of this.

Author: Cherrón