America's Greatest Lesson: A Slam Poem

How can we let this slide?

We accept the boosting prejudice and feed off of it with pride as we watch our own species divide into two major factions,

It is time we take action and do things not for our own satisfaction.

It is time we refuse to watch our own blood brothers and sisters get sucked into the vortex of human desires leading a life that is uninspired and small.

We watch as America spreads the mold of racism through its built walls,

The same walls that will soon separate us from our Mexican neighbors,

Forcing them to obey our orders and concede to our “small favors.”

America stands as if it is almighty and tall.

But in reality, America enjoys the thrill of watching other countries fall.

Mexicans are associated with drugs as if there is no such thing as an “American thug” and crime is the only thing that runs through Mexican blood.

America is blinded with hatred, refusing to recognize their manipulated isolation and intentional complications of integration between the nations.

I turn on my TV to watch the news and the story that night is nothing new.

The fatality rates of blacks in Chicago have spiked dramatically as police brutality becomes a normality and America denies the fact that these people are dying due to its racist mentalities.

It denies the fact that they are murdered for the color of their skin,

As 73 black citizens are thrown on their knees with a gun to their chins annually.

As 73 black citizens are killed every year because of police brutality in the city of Chicago alone.

America shrugs it off and insists that these officers be dismissed for they are insane,

And they have no idea that what they are doing is profane, and yet as civilians, we continue to explain that our country is accepting and loving and humane.

It is no wonder black citizens have a growing fear in their hearts as they are approached by officers.

And when a Georgia cop assures a white woman that only the blacks will feel the cold barrel to their heads,

America covers themselves in a blanket as they snuggle in bed disregarding the racism as it continues to spread and instead, focusing on the newest Starbucks drink and the IOS 11 update forgetting the constant state it’s in as it fixates on achieving the little things.

When my friend’s mother is told that she is a terrorist for the scarf she wears on her head,

Or when she is begged not to shoot,

How can I love this country of inbreds who believe they have the say to tell me what to do?

I am tired of being associated with the 9/11 attacks as if i were even alive when it this horrible tragedy reached its climax-I wasn’t.

When my aunt has to take off her scarf for the sake of social interactions between her community,

I blame the prejudice mindsets that stand between people and unity,

I blame the people who were born with an immunity to racism and label any acts of an Arab as terrorism.

The same ones who give the whites favoritism using euphemisms to defend their blatant ostracism.

I blame those who can never seem to distinguish my religion from my ethnicity,

Constantly associating beliefs with nationality.

I blame those who tell me that I identify as white and Arab is “not a real race.”

The same ones who have never faced the shame and disgrace America places on you when you are conflicting.

When you refuse to be a part of the majority.

I am told to check the box next to white as if being as Arab is associated with the feeling of inferiority.

I am not even recognized for who I truly am.

And just as a fire trickles down a burning building my identification is stripped from within my brain all the way down to the tip of my toes depleting any qualities that define who I am.

America teaches me to be shameful for who I am.

America teaches me that I will be accepted when I change myself.

When I change who I am.