Poem: Breaking the silence

Breaking the Silence

By Toya Y. Williams

Hollow before this crowd
We are all brothers and sisters of the same nation
We all bleed red
We all bleed red, white and blue

Hollow
A deep echo inside freedom
Screaming to be free

And that flag that she sowed together
Was held up with minority hands
And bares the mark of minority blood

Deep exhale of slavery
Mental or physical
I wait patiently in the shadows

We all bleed red, white and blue?
Colors, Colors of freedom?
A Minority silence

Shadows no long exist I am here before this crowd
Here before this nation
A Woman, A Man
African American, Hispanic, Asian, Arabic, Jewish

I am the colors of that flag
My hands can still hold it up
Minority blood still marks the symbol of freedom

I shattered the glass ceiling of oppression
Glass ceiling of ignorance
We build on minds
We dodge land mines of stupidity
That has trapped our ancestors for centuries
Centuries of grief
If grief ever exists for the simple fact I am black

I roar to be heard through time and space
And those before me that roared like the king of the jungle
Where shot down and erased

Not from history…But from the minds of those that love to oppress

I know words are like bullets
But those before whose words were like bullets
Caught them in their heads and hands

I will never look back but if I did, I would never turn into a pillar of
salt…
When I turn around to explore history I will transform into a golden statue

I shattered that glass false concept of what a minority is suppose to be!
And being me means catching mental bullets through my hands and head
Nailed to this cross they watch and wait

And they hate
Enemy of the State
Black honors before thee
I will honor thee

The slave.. The free man
The educated one who built machines of the future of past
I will honor thee

In my words…In my art…In my strong voice.
Child of a slave numb…Numb…Their words are like bullets…Bullets
Hollow before this crowd
I just broke the silence

Toya Y. Williams is a final year student at Virginia Wesleyan College, Virginia Beach, USA. She was awarded a Presidential and White House Silver medal for Community Services in 2005 and is a 2006 Poetry Ambassador for the United States.

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