Microaggression
That thing that is a thing
That really isn’t a thing
It’s real in a scholarly article or
In a library database
But the minute the word leaves my lips
To describe how I live
It’s fake
Unreasonable doubt
Microaggression
Too vulgar for your after-school special
But not enough for a therapy session
Because there’s no cure for oppression
There’s no medicine for this disease
Even though I have symptoms everyday
Symptoms that you may not ever even see
That no vaccination or inoculation could
Ever prevent
This is a diagnosis; this is a dose of reality
My pain, my wound, my infliction, my condition – it’s there
Trust me
Blind faith
Microaggression
Is when you don’t like someone for no reason —
Wait, there is a reason, but it remains to be unsaid
Even though it’s in your heart and
All up in your head
But you can hear it if
You’re really quiet and you really listen
To your bias and to your intuition
Microaggression by definition is
Subtle discrimination
Every day, threaded
The fabric of this nation
Sight seen and unseen
Microagression
Is If I looked like you, I would have gotten the job that you do and
I really like your people, and
I just love their hair too
Can I touch it? I mean, is it okay with you? or
You’re my favorite friend of color, my brother
Who knows your truth better than me?
Microaggression
I find you in traveling lectures and
In fancy books by fancy smancy professors
But I see you more in the hallways
And in the mall
And at work and
At the bar and
On Facebook and
On the news
And in my neighborhood
And in my blues
Too close to home
Microaggression
But you go by another name:
The girl that sits next to me in class who
Covers her tests with her hands thinking
Her answers are the only reason I
Pass
Or the mother that grabs her child’s hand real tight
When I walk by at night
And in the daytime and
The co-worker who pretends to be my friend but
Soon as I turn my back, she’s criticizing me and the position
I don’t deserve to be in
Who’s who?
You’re with me everyday
Some of you I don’t even know
Yet and still, I know you better than I
Ever knew myself
Dr. Kiara Shanay Lee 