Black Girl Classic

My future is my present and my past I’m Timeless

My future is my present and my past I’m Timeless

They say I’m lost

They say I’ve forgotten

But I’ve been doing me since the dawn of time

I was Eve in the Eden the Original Mother

I am Royalty

I was the longest running Egyptian Queen

So bad they called me King

I was beautiful and powerful as Queen Nefertiti

And as Cleopatra

I was stolen and drowning in the Atlantic Ocean

But I survived and emerged as powerful as ever

They tried to break me and rape me until my culture was raped away

They told me I had no history and I was out of place

They had me confused and speaking new tongues

That seemed to leave me lost in translation

They pressed me til I Pressed my tresses

They left me stressed and feeling oppressed

So I sang the Blues in this strange new tongue

I made lemons into lemonade and sang of “Strange Fruit”

I was Billie Holiday and Marian Anderson

New look, new culture, new language, new me

But I missed the old look of an African Queen

So I dug deep and found Soul

I was Nina Simone

I had Soul glow and my Fro

I am Black Power

But everything wasn’t Straight

So I became Rosa Parks and Coretta Scott King

And there I was again

They loved me and they Dreaded me

Their knickers were in a bunch when my hair was in a Knot

So I Wrapped it, transformed it and became Beyoncé

And gained mass appeal

Then I got political and became Michelle Obama

I had people saying I was Wavy and I knew I was Straight

I rediscovered myself and remembered I am cultured

Now I’m Straight, Wavy, and I got them Twisted

Then I look around at myself making a presence

And I remember

My future is my present and my past, I’m timeless

About the Author.

Stacy St. Hilaire is the author of “The Facts: Collection of Poems” and the cofounder and Editor-in-Chief of Femmily magazine. She also works with Collective Culture Magazine and has pieces in the I AM Zine and Dale Shield’s iForColor.Org. Stacy is committed to educating others and changing minds.

To learn more about WorkSchool.co, you can visit here at https://www.workschool.co/ . You can follow WorkSchool on Instagram, LinkedIn , and Youtube.

Originally published in “The Facts: Collection of Poems”