Hey Black Boy

Hey Black boy

I saw you as a child
I felt your eagerness to explore
You just loved to play
Your style was the vivid splatter of grass stains on the knees of your jeans, which never seemed to fit around your waist—a testament to their previous owner
Your smile held back a pain you never let show
But you let it grow

Hey Black boy

I love you
Words you never heard, but always desired, inspired by pain that drains a soul

You hoped for more
You hoped to be seen
You hoped for an intimacy you’ve only seen behind screens
I know you fall so easily, because you only want to be caught
You only want to be loved

Hey Black boy

I see you, you exist
No need to resist and persist in your attempts to perform, to adorn a mask that projects the version of yourself you’d only expose to the world
You learned not to be too vulnerable
You felt the sting of rejection and for your own protection, you withdrew from the world

Hey Black boy

You are more than enough
I feel your pain
The feeling of never being enough for anyone
Your skin—too dark
Your lips—too big
You—too you
Rejection had you question yourself
Your tears, longer than your years
Your fears, run wild

Hey Black boy

You are perfection
You are the manifestation of a wonderful creation
You are what happens when the sun shines and cast its rays on the ground below
You are growth
You are sprung from the earth, a rose; a rose nestled with thorns and caressed, petal-by-petal

Hey Black boy

Your mind holds the blueprint to our tomorrow
Your hands, will build us up
Your mouth, will speak life

Hey Black boy, you are who the world is waiting for