“You can’t love the tree but hate its roots”

You walk through the orchard of this stolen land

Reaching for the branches with a steady, greedy hand

You pluck the jazz from our throats, the rhythm from our feet,

You love the slang on your tongue, the swagger in your stride

With your shoulders laid back, posture high, and your arms swaying from left to right

You find the nectar of our struggle to be something fine and sweet

You wear our style like a costume, you speak for foul play

One moment your laughing with your so called “crew” and the next- 

what our parents like to call it–black girl magic, becomes a menace

Our presence becomes a trespass you did not authorize.

It’s crazy how fast the hands that were clapping reach for the phone to dial

A three digit death sentence, to sweep our shadows from your path today. 

But a tree is not a ghost; it is a living, breathing thing, 

And you cannot love the harvest while you hate the land it brings.

You cannot love the fruit and curse the roots from which it grew

The soil, deep and dark that held the weight and fed the world for you.

You stream the hustle, you worship the flow

But you lock the doors when you see a “glow in the row”

You want the beat from the trap, the soul from the street

But your turn a blind eye once it turns into blood on the concrete

America is a house built on my own bones

It is the marrow of the slave, the Hispanic, and the Native American–

The foundational architecture “stolen land”

Once I refuse to worship a ceiling that crushes me

Suddenly, my tongue was too heavy for your dinner table

You say I’ve grown too loud, “too woke” “too weary”

It’s a jagged, inconvenient truth: that my demand for air

It’s treated like a crime against your comfort.

We are the architects of the air you breathe, 

The ones who sowed the rhythm that you try to thrive

America is the garden built on history you try to hide,

Whitewashing the bark to mask the blood you tried to dry inside

But the roots go deeper than your “ice”

They are the anchor of the culture, for they have paid the heavy price.

You want the Blackness, but you want it filtered.

If you pull the root, the branch will break, and the fruit will surely rot

Leaving you with nothing but a barren plot.

For the Blackness you consume, is the sap of everyday life.

So the next time you boastfully wear your thick, gold hoops

Or drape yourself in the latest streetwear “trend”

Or taste the bussin salt of the kitchen you don’t own

Or when you hear the “saxophones getting louder” to any minor inconvenience

Remember the heavy anchors of influence

Stop reaching for the branches, until you are ready to honor the dirt.