Fetishized; my worthiness is measured
in cup sizes and big booty.
Integrity is compromised and dismissed.
Body parts named- policed and sexualized.
They say; “it’s the sway of my African belle
derriere, the clumsiness of my breasts, the
thickness of my lips and the arch of my back”.
Objectified by the media, my nudity is
plastered on billboards, social media and marketed
in raunchy music videos and sex magazines.
Bartered in foreign currency for a bit of the
exotic experience.
Perceived as promiscuous- sold for consumption.
My body is just entertainment and a peculiar
scientific breakthrough.
I am a product of disrespect.
The streets mock my pride, patriarchal
society trashes my name with a twisted
perception of my body.
Lewd; incapable of love- a belligerent
woman with an insatiable sexual appetite.
My tinted shade is salaciously appreciated
with sexist comments, but not pursued.
I am only good enough for an experiment.
Grope me in public- bring me to my knees because
somehow my history conditioned me to be a sex
slave and the rape culture is nothing but a myth.
His ego must be massaged.
Stereotyped; I am the proverbial angry black
woman waving the blood stained banner and
cussing out at everyone- like the world owes
me something.
Baptized with sperm as “Jezebel”- promiscuous
and hyper-sexual.
Archetypes of my history are smudged on the
walls of public lavatories as a legacy of colonialism
and imprinted on my consciousness.
Voyeurs of my ancestors lined up on the auction
block come back to me in sepia each time my black
femininity is masqueraded on the stripper pole.
I am a symbol of trauma and degradation.
I wear the shroud of shame that Sarah Baartman
wore when she was paraded in the freak shows in
London and Paris.
“Too much”, they say- My body is too much!
“Afroetry, that dress is indecent; it doesn’t
flatter your body size”.
“Your hair is nappy; you need a few lashes of
lye on your scalp”.
See, i can’t control the way my rebellious curves
riot inside my dress.
I just can’t stop my belle derriere from bouncing
when i walk.
Anecdotes of my femininity now catalyzed
by stereotypes leave shards of my identity
dripping over my thighs.
Affecting the way that i see myself in the
presence of the hegemonic depictions of my
Afrocentrism.
I am not a object to be fetishized- or apart of
the body shaming brood in twisted society’s
hypersexualization of the black woman.
I wear this beautiful body with pride.
©FloetryC 2017
floeticgibbersandrants 