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By: Lavanya Kathirgamanathan
She walks her way
With her eyes glistening
The way that she speaks
Everyone is listening
Embracing her curls
As the wind grazes across her face
People are staring at her
When she wears that red lace.
She feels flustered
With every step she takes
The men are whistling at her
She needs a break
Sipping tea while she sits
With her beautiful lips
Feeling calm and relieved
While gripping on her hips.
The walk continues
As she is with her thoughts
Sometimes I feel beautiful
Sometimes I am lost
My mother gave me her beauty
Grandma did too…
I can not hate on myself
I am a beautiful living truth.
Skin Colour:
By: Lavanya Kathirgamanathan
When I was nine
Someone told me
I was too dark to be on their team.
I was confused and sad
So, I wrote out my feelings
And it still continued to bother me.
I woke up the next day,
Avoiding that someone
Until they came up to me and handed me this cream.
My mom makes me wear this,
Bottle labeled as ‘Fair and Lovely’
It is supposed to make you look lighter.
I was holding in this scream.
I went into the washroom and cried
And realized I was not accepted
I pretended to be sick to prevent school
And started applying this cream, consistently.
I broke out in patches
Itches, scars, and burns.
Made me realise this cream was destroying me
It was getting worse and worse.
I decided to be alone
For the rest of the school semester.
I hated myself
I gave in, surrendered.
I took some time to think
About that Fair and Lovely cream.
Told myself this is not me
To listen to these things.
Next year
I woke up
I told myself to never listen to anyone
And I spoke up.
I gave back their Fair and Lovely
That I kept
And told that someone
To never disrespect.
From that moment on,
I realized
No one can compete.
If you want to talk about my skin colour,
Make sure you
Think
Before
You
Speak.
My dark skin is beautiful,
A one of a kind creation.
All my BIPOC community
Stand by each other
And fight this discrimination.
Lavanya Kathirgamanathan is one of the Writers for this year’s publication at Black Voice. She’s a recent graduate from Toronto Metropolitan University, where she studied Journalism and will further her education in Human Resources at George Brown College. Lavanya has experience writing for multiple publications and has her own food blog on social media. Lavanya’s main goal as a writer for the Black Voice publication is to showcase Black excellence within the community, and in the city of Toronto.