Heavy

by Kiese Laymon

This summer, it took one final conversation with Grandmama for me to understand that no one in our family—and very few folk in this nation—has any desire to reckon with the weight of where we’ve been, which means no one in our family—and very few folk in this nation—wants to be free.

but y’all taught me indirectly that unacknowledged scars accumulated in battles won often hurt more than battles lost.

Part of it was Layla was a black girl and I was taught by big boys who were taught by big boys who were taught by big boys that black girls would be okay no matter what we did to them.

Both of y’all knew, and showed me, how we didn’t even have to win for white folk to punish us. All we had to do was not lose the way they wanted us to.

“It ain’t about making white folk feel what you feel,” she said. “It’s about not feeling what they want you to feel. Do you hear me? You better know from whence you came and forget about those folk.”

America seems filled with violent people who like causing people pain but hate when those people tell them that pain hurts.

Any real change implies the breakup of the world as one has always known it, the loss of all that gave one an identity, the end of safety.

I’d fallen in love with provoking white folk, which really meant I’d fallen in love with begging white folk to free us by demanding that they radically love themselves more.