Dear Black Girl,

I have a hard time even saying that
And this is part of the problem
I don’t want you to be labeled
Black girl
As I was once
White boy
And I cringe that I am now
White man
And I feel ashamed around
Black woman
Because when I watched
The Color of Fear
Identifying my own prejudices
Going back to late nights
Walking near Lake Merritt
I know deep down
I was more afraid of
Black
Than I was of
White
I hate that I was like that
I am so self-conscious
That instead of simply
Letting go of all that bullshit
I over-correct
I over-think
I am so self-conscious now
Around
Black people
I have made myself
Whiter
And when you’re older
And you meet
Someone like me
Who thinks your lips
Voluptuous
Your hair
Magical
Your color contrasts
Lustrous
You’ll probably wonder if he’s just
Fetishizing
Black woman
And he may not know that himself as
White man
But I have hope
And here is why
Bear with me
When in college
I took Native American Studies
Which was natural
My parents
White man
White woman
Who fetishize Native American culture
I developed a crush
On my professor with her
High Cheekbones
Nez Perce woman
I too was fetishizing now
Flash forward fifteen years
I am divorced from
White woman
Soul-searching
Lost
Meet someone on OKCupid
Whom I assume is
Swedish woman
She speaks Swedish
I try to speak a little too
Get to know her
And her beauty
She is
Kickapoo and Yaqui woman
Didn’t see it because of
Irish side
And the years she spent in Sweden
Without fetishizing
I fell in love with her
Native American hair
And unsmiling
NDN smile
And I can call her
Fierce and
Proud
I don’t feel like an asshole
My kids are the
Most beautiful humans
One of them looks
Kickapoo boy
The other seems more
White girl
Both are friends
With
Black boys
Black girls
And neither has any
Racial fear or
Fetishizing
Or anything else
To feel shame about