IDENTITY
AFRICAN
I am rooted.
Ask the land.
I am lyric.
Ask the sea.
SLAVE
America is where
I became an animal.
American is where
I became a nigger.
NEGRO
Trapped here
in Segregation.
Trapped here
in Integration.
COLORED
I am weary of working
to prove myself equal.
I will use education
to make my children superior.
BLACK
My heart is a fist.
I fix Blackness.
My fist is a heart.
I beat Whiteness.
AFRICAN AMERICAN
Before I was born,
I absorbed struggle.
Just looking
at history hurts.
–Thomas Sayers Ellis, “The Identity Repairman”
another eye opens 
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