Having Soul
There’s never an easy way to strike up a racist conversation. At least you’d think there wasn’t but it’s funny how many I manage I find myself in, without trying too hard.

Well, I guess you don’t have to try too hard when you’re a walking billboard for biracial relationships, but still you’d think people wouldn’t be so blasé about it.

I mean, she asked me flat out;
“What does it feel like to be white? You do know that you’re white…don’t you?”

What does it feel like to be hated at least half of the time?
Do you connect more with your white side because you look so white or, to your black side because you live around here- because that really makes you black.

And is it true what they say about white people?
You know, that they have no soul.

Your mother’s white isn’t she?

She even went on to insinuate that any association with my own family was evil.

That I should denounce them immediately, accept the inevitable, and cleanse myself because it wasn’t my fault after all and don’t I want to save my soul?

Under those terms, I’m not so sure, so I asked her;
“What does it feel like to be black? You do know that you’re black…don’t you?”

What does it feel like to be hated at least all of the time?
Does it hurt?

Is it something tangible you can feel like 50 pounds of water pressure in your face, a bloody whip at your back, or dirt under your nails after you’ve crawled your way back from the brink of death only to have your throat slit in the name of white supremacy?

Can you imagine hanging from poplar trees like strange rotting fruit to be jeered at, or having your children sold to the highest bidder with tears streaming down their faces-

As their eyes silently begged you to protect them while you’re bound and gagged at the foot of an unrepentive white man?

Do you know what that must have been like?
Have you forgotten the fight for equality so soon?
The fight that not only your parents bleed through but so did mine.
Or did the struggle end for you on May 17th, 59 years ago, only 59 years ago-My mother can still remember days like those.

As 5% of the white kids still attending school in the intercity she knows what it feels like to stand out in a crowd;
Pale white face, long red hair, and bright green eyes.

Did she have soul? You’re damn right she did.

Her soul kept her back straight when chubby mocha fingers pulled at her straightened locks and called her cracker.

Her soul pushed her head up when cruel vanilla fist declared her a nigger-lover not worthy of their stature.

Her soul endured the years of interracial hatred and 4 kids later her soul still keeps her going.
Her soul is in me like a country, a proud Irishman standing strong against oppression and greed.

Her soul bleeds through me; the song of my ancestors from coast to coast spanning oceans and continents sings in my veins so loud I can hear little elves save their tribal drums, their war cries, their bagpipes and their pleas for freedom.
So do I think I have soul? You’re damn right I do.

I have the soul of many nations, how about you?