Oh my distance relatives,
My heart is a bloody mess,
Impaled with scraggy dagger,
Seeing all these racial and social injustice,
On a global scale.
I tried to be colour blind,
But the media headlines render me short sighted.
I look at myself, I see black.
I look at you, I see white.
Is there biological reason for this complexion differences?
Are we that genetically different, after all?
The ‘I can’t breathe’,
‘Hands up, don’t shoot’ movements
Rekindled my frustration.
Low self-esteem turned depression,
My inspiration in humanity dried out,
My motivation to better humanity deflated,
My aspiration further humanity achievements faded away,
Because I have no living heroes,
No Black role model to look up to.
The few historical heroes of my colours,
White washed in Hollywood classic and academic text books,
Have you seen the Riddley’s Exodus, lately?
It’s a joke, right?
The best of them, Imhotep,
Portrayed as a blood seeking,
Fleshing ripping monster,
In the movie, the Mummy.
Growing up,
I was caught up in the racial inferiority complex crisis,
Raging within myself,
I pondered in angst,
Question my blackness?
Here, I can relate to you,
Young black kids.
Back to the origin,
In the wombs of our mothers,
A small world larger than life,
Every one of us begins with a molecular explosion,
Precipitated by melanin that galvanise our fathers’ sperms,
That ameliorates our mothers’ ovaries.
The cradle of humanity,
Out of Africa,
Where all human races began,
If not for the Pineal Gland,
In the Thalamus of our Brains,
Lies the tractable melanin.
Activated at will,
Signalled by the power of light and sounds,
That protect us all,
Black and White alike,
From the harsh climatic changes.
My ancestors,
Who stayed put in Africa,
Kept their black pigmentation,
To survive the stark scourging tropical climate.
My afro hair,
Their hair follicle,
Is retained its ribbon like,
Shaped to make my black hair grow curly,
Kept away from my Central Nervous System pathway,
At the back of my neck.
My wider nostrils,
Let cool air in to my lungs and brain,
Hence,
My africoid flatter noses.
As human multiply,
Vast the land needed to wander and converge,
Hence to cultivate,
The exodus of human race out of Africa,
Caught up in the ice age.
By God’s willing,
Rescued by the miracle of the melanin,
Altered our dark skin,
To the best suitable complexion,
To survive the inhospitable temperate ice age climate.
Your white pigmentation,
Hair follicle,
Nostril, Eyes pupils,
Metamorphosed into an European phenotypes.
A means to natural selection,
You may say?
Ridded you off your ancestral black skin,
A biological survival measure,
For your ancestors who survived the Ice Age.
Your hair follicle modifies into straw like shape,
To make your hair stretch longer,
To protect your Central Nervous System pathways,
At the back of your neck,
As to keep you warmer.
Your Pineal Gland deactivated your melanin,
Depigmented your ancestral black skin,
Induced by less sunlight,
Your vitamin E secretes less and less,
To allow your skin absorb,
The puck of sunlight,
Faintly shined through the ice age thick cloud,
To cultivate its Vitamin D,
It nourishes your bone with calcium.
Like the computers,
Need air to cool down its processors,
But in the ice age,
You need not.
A Flatter nose of yours,
Was evolved into wider nostrils,
By the triumph of melanin,
Freezing to death was eliminated.
Thus, your white race,
Tribes and nations,
Were born.
This oasis of knowledge,
Is refused to be taught in class rooms
This complex and rigid,
But simple anthropological facts,
Posed a threat to some Western critics,
Determined to racially divide us,
Want this subject to diminish.
You see,
Oh distant Relatives,
That we are not much a difference from one another,
Go on take a closer look?
It is saddening,
Racism divides us,
Rather than unites us,
Isn’t racism just plain stupid?
Luqman Temitayo Onikosi
