Not to Wear White

by Kritika P., 15

My mother tells me
Not to wear the color white,
Because it makes my complexion look darker.

She tells me I should always look paler than I am,
Because that is the only way to fit in.

That I was not made
To bear the color of purity,
As my own color,
Isn’t considered pure by the world.

But I ask my mother,
Why am I,
An infant born same as every other,
Burdened by my color?

Forced to conform to a world,
At which my skin is laughed upon.

Stripped of my rights,
Due to something as insignificant,
As my skin.

Because I am not my color.
I am me,
A person,
A human.

Not a crayon in a box,
Or a shade of brown.

Yet I am still told
Not to wear the color white.

Trumbull, Connecticut