Sugar Free Caramel

So my Gender and Women's Studies 445 professor asked us to do presentations and they could range from personal stories about our bodies to a cultural artifact that relates to things we've learned in class. I wrote a poem about myself and at the request of my persistent blonde roommate, I decided to post it here.

Hope you enjoy. 

~Sugar Free Caramel~

By Katie Hands

My father is black and my mother is white

That makes me dark but it also makes me light

I change like the seasons, getting colder and getting warmer

Does that mean I am my father in the summer and my mother in the winter?

People try to identify me

While I struggle to identify myself

My parents see color and so do I

I see it in plain sight while others pretend it doesn't exist

They tell me they are blind to color

And I almost feel sorry for them

A world without color must literally be dull

I see my two families and the colors they bring to the table

One family is in the dark while one family is in the light

Although under closer inspection we look relatively the same

It's said that the world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters

That we all have light and dark inside of us

Does it matter if mine is seen on the outside too?

Color almost exists in a world of it's own

Where "white" dabbles in polygamy

Married to privilege, access and opportunity

While "black" stays monogamous

Settling down beside prejudice
Ironically society frowns upon the former lifestyle choice

If culture sees my mother as light and radiant

They does it see my father as dark and sinister?

Are they a non theatrical version of Beauty and the Beast?

But then what does that make me?

Am I Glinda the Good Witch when it's 40 degrees

And the Wicked Witch when it's 70?

If I were forced to choose a side

I don't think I could

I can't simply pick a white tree out of a black forest

Or a speck of black sand scattered on a white beach

 Besides, I don't think it would be fair

To choose one over the other

You combine black with white paint and you end up with grey

But the mirror shows me I am not grey

But a simple reflection

A reflection of what society deems safe and what it deems deviant

A reflection of my mother and of my father

Of their bravery, care and love

I am not grey but a reflection

A reflection of myself

My shadow roams free in the sun but it hides in the shade

There is golden hair under the sun and dark hair in the cover of night

I see my father's curls and my mother's ears

My mother's hands and my father's eyes

I am not grey but the offspring

Of opposite ends of the spectrum

I am my mother and I am my father

Thanks to them I can see me