Sept. 26, 2022

Audio

I Wanna Talk About the White Women Now

(after Supremacy by Ariana Brown)

By Walela Nehanda

View full text below.

I Wanna Talk About the White Women Now

(after Supremacy by Ariana Brown)

By Walela Nehanda

I wanna talk about the white women now

How they think they done stole God or the sun from me

How they would press their forearm to mine at 8 years old

Saying, "look I'm almost as dark as you."

I wanna talk about the white women now

And my first “boyfriend,” in 5th grade

An Austrian boy who done had puppy love for me

And every white girl wrinkling their nose

as if to say "why" And all them girls are women now

Who ask the same of anyone I choose to love 

I wanna talk about the white women now

And Catholic school And Blonde haired

Blue eyes girls Calling me Chewbaca

And Bon qui qui Demand I twerk like

 all them Black girls in that one music video.

To them,

I am a caricature meant to pantomime

what they think being Black is

I wannna talk about one white girl 

and how she sent two white boys

to send me threats and say no one

would ever date me But I was the one

who almost got suspended for getting

ready to almost beat that ass

Funny this thing they do,

Set a fire then say they almost burned alive

I want to talk about the white women now

About my theology teacher who called me a 2nd daughter

or a mentor who called me a 2nd daughter

Each made a charity case of me Each saw a profit in me

A house slave But when a house nigga done realized the

plantation is a lie Suddenly, the white women know to do the same

- Like a whistle to Emmett Each wants to make their fragility

a sentence to a brutal death Called me problem child

thief, ungrateful, bitch

That's the thing, truth will make a mirror

outta these women and they wanna destroy it

Which means they want to destroy me too

I wanna talk about all the white women friends

Most of whom I've had to make a burial of

And how they fix their mouths to call me a

Black supremacist, when I demand liberation

Call me angry, when I say hurt

Here, they want me knees as an offering

Curse me when I don't want to be them

Curse me when they can't get like me

Imagine such violence to go unnoticed

Imagine to be the best poet

Turn a metaphor like a knife in a Black person’s back

And somehow the death is ruled a suicide

And somehow this is what makes white women

believe themselves as omnipotent

How they can be everywhere and nowhere at once

What supremacy.

Walela Nehanda is a cultural worker and writer born and raised in Los Angeles (Tongva Territory). Their work centers on disability, care work, Black liberation and self determination, gender, autonomy, generational trauma, and more.  

Image description: Walela in a white ruffled crop top and wearing a white skirt leaned over with their forearms resting on their knees. Walela is slightly facing the camera and looking down. Walela has a buzzcut and is wearing clear and gold glasses, pearls with turquoise, pearls with malachite, gold hoops, a gold medallion necklace, and their tattoos are visible on their chest: a snake with an arrowhead. On their left forearm tattooed: a Black Power first, Emmett sTilll written in bold, and a flower on their hand, with small lettering on their knuckles, with a gold elephant ring being worn.

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