Yes, I Am Fucking Angry
Hayley Headley
For me.... The world is a battlefield
The war for ownership of my body, my rights, my very person... It’s ongoing
The first rule of navigating this world is to know my enemy.
I know the slick smile that creeps onto his lips when I walk by
I know the shape of his mouth just before he calls out -
Ey gyal, is weh yuh di gwan wid
I know the grip of his hands as he grasps for my attention
But there is more to fear than the obvious
It’s the polite and kind that scare me the most
For me... it's about what they have to say
It’s the pity in their eyes as they hear your story
“That’s so sad, but you know it's not all men”
It's the inquisition in their voices as they look at your home
“So when are you going to have kids?”
It’s the sick sick feeling that I get when they stare at me and ask... But why are you so angry?
You know people would listen more if you were more calm
But not all men
Not all white feminists
Not all white people
The rage... I can feel it boiling within me as they say
Why are you so mad?
I’m just trying to help
You know you can’t repeat the same thing over and over
Honestly, it is just so exhausting to be friends with you
All I want to know is when THE FUCK did I ask
Yes I am black
Yes I am a woman
And YES I am fucking angry!
Tell me why I shouldn’t be.
Tell me what there is to be so goddamn calm about
Tell me what there is to be quiet for?
Tell me why the fuck you don’t care
Black women can’t breathe without this constant critique
This never ending side eye
This overwhelming judgement
Sit like this-
Don't sound so black-
Yeah you can be political but can you be funny about it?
Black women can’t breathe out here
Can’t stand up or shout out about our oppression
Because it isn’t presentable
Police brutality, school segregation, gang violence, racial profiling, the ungodly sense of privilege that just radiates off of white men
Tell me why y’all aint mad.
And yes my feminism intersectional
Because my oppression is too
So yeah...
I am angry
And what about it?
ON ‘Yes, I Am Fucking Angry’
This poem unpacks the unique experience of being a black woman in the world today, as racism and gender discrimination are always inseparable issues. It illustrates the accumulated impact of micro and macro-aggressions that eventually lead into an explosion of (warranted) anger, an emotion that dominates the damaging stereotype that has been placed upon us for decades: the angry black woman.
The art in the poem’s thumbnail is courtesy of © Whitney Madueke (@whitneymillustrations).