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Please Don’t Tell Me (from the poetry book "In and Out of Season"



Please don’t tell me
You don’t see color
 Don’t worry
I ain’t mad at you
I’m just confused
Why don’t you?
Would you look at a sunset and say
“Oh I don’t see its radiance”
Or feel the breeze of a Colorado summer morning and say
“Oh I don’t feel that cool breeze on my face”?
Now I’m not delusional
I know I’m not a sunset or a morning breeze
But I am a man
A black man
And I see you, brother
So please don’t tell me
You don’t see me

Ignoring our diversity
Is not bringing us closer together
It’s creating an invisible wall of silence
Acceptance because I assimilated is not acceptance
And pretending that I “fit in” when I don’t creates suspicion and ignorance
Fear and tension
The Enemy uses these weapons to create the borderlines between us
So talk to me
I want to talk to you
Listen to me
I want to listen to you
We don’t have to agree on everything
Believe it or not
I don’t agree with every black person I know either
But the love is there
And isn’t love greater than colorblindness?
So please, don’t tell me
You don’t see my color
When God intentionally made it obvious



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