By: Chinenye Kalu
We are all the same
We are equal
Your colour doesn’t matter
Your story doesn’t matter
Your gender doesn’t matter
We live in the 21st century
So why do you keep obsessing about the past?
Why do you keep playing the victim?
I reach my hand out
I try to get help
Like everyone else does
I get turned away
After all, we are all the same
So why do you think you deserve special treatment
You’re not special..
They say..
You’re not a victim
We are all the same
So I hide away
Lock my door
Let the rain downpour
Knowing that if I speak out..
I’d get turned away
We are all the same..
You know what.. You’re right
We should all be the same..
So let me mold myself to make ensure I fit in with everyone else
I’ll make my jump voice jump the octave
Make my hair look like everyone’s else’s
Avoid speaking about my..
My so-called “lived experiences”??
What is even is a lived experience
No one has a unique or “lived” experience
Considering the fact that we are all the same
We all have the same experiences…
We all bleed the same colour
History is history
What does any of that have to do with today?
We are all the same
I’m so sick of this neoliberalist fantasy
I’m tired of pretending to not live in reality
No
We are not all the same
How can we all be the same…
When it’s only certain groups of people..
That are out there getting killed for just choosing to exist
Certain people that have had their lands taken from them..
For simply daring to exist in a world..
That would rather live in ignorance
A world where women like me get called sassy and dramatic
For daring to defend ourselves from traumatic incidents
How many tears have to be shed?
How many lives have to be lost?
How many women have to go missing?
How many cultures have to be erased?
Before we stop living in denial?
And realize that..
We are not all the same
This poem is written by C.K.