Stained a deep hue of ebony – Hardliner would be lying
If she said that she has never had any trouble
Seeing herself beyond society’s false images of black beauty
Looking at it now – this painful journey of self-acceptance
Is a rite of passage for most – if not every dark skinned sista
And a lot of sisters out there have not freed their inner slaves
To find peace beyond their dream of skin bleached acceptance

Thank you sister – Hatshepsut purrs –
Drawing reference to her emancipation of Hardliner’s house slave
The Grand High Queen’s tone drips with complacency
And Hardliner knows that the goading is a test
Of her resolve to contain her inner ratchet
But this time sista gurl aint gon fail
Never mind that her left eye has gone into a twitching fit
Yeh she had issues with the Ancient Pharaoh
For freeing her inner slave –
C’mon now – how you gon roll up on a sista
And free her house nigga – all militant like that
You dayum skippy Hardliner’s Ego was incensed
But anyway that’s all water under the bridge

Tell that to your left eye sister
Hatshepsut’s mirth induces more eye twitching
And Hardliner does some deep breathing to
Maintain her grip on Ms. Ratchet
The devil is a liar – she aint gon fail today!

The Grand High Queen dressed in Pharonic regalia
Today she exudes the energy Sekhmet – the Lion Goddess
Who she is famed for personifying on her temples

Now coming up coal coloured with hair that resisted
All attempts to be groomed into one plait –
Heyul two – three – four – o.k not even five
Sista rocked that super tight afro
Hardliner would have loved to learn of
This badass brown skinned woman Pharaoh
Who shook up Ancient Egypt when she proclaimed
Herself daughter of the God Amun in the flesh
And ruled fearless like a man
All props to you sister –
Hardliner bows respectfully to the great Pharaoh
Cause only a badass chick with iron balls
Could have held thangs down in chauvinistic Kemet for over two decades

Although taught by her aunt to be proud of her dark skin
Hardliner would have loved to learn of African civilizations
Like Nubia – Ethiopia – Timbuktu and the Zulu Nation
To feel that kinship with badass female rulers
Like Nzinga of Angola who was a nightmare for Portuguese Conquistadors
Or that one eyed fabled warrior Queen /Kentake of Meroe who
As legend would have it – astride her war elephant
Repelled Alexander the Great who had the audacity
To roll up to her Nubian gates
Then a thought just dawns on her
You know mama – in a past life I could have been you
Her jocularity is met with a piercing yet pensive stare

Maybe sister – you could have been – Hatshepsut states

Hardliner can’t tell whether or not the the High Queen is jiving
Coupled with an eerie calm soaking up the atmosphere
Sista gurl has grown a wee bit wary
Hatshepsut is silent and distant – seemingly communicating
With some being – or maybe time itself
She finally speaks – her voice cutting the silence
And what if you had such knowledge sister
That your roots go further back than the Plantation
That spawned your house slave
Would it have stopped your yearning for long hair and pale skin?
Would people have then commented on how pretty you were?
Would you be equal to those half white girls
At school who flaunted their beauty in your face
With their soft spiral curls and fake foreign accents?

Hardliner feels like she has been punched in the gut
And all the sass she can rummage up is – how you be mama?
It would appear that the Ancient Pharaoh has found
Yet another deep beyond her abyss of issues
Hardliner’s house slave may be singing her freedom song now
But that bish left all her mess for sista gurl to clean up

And all the world knows that you don’t like hard work

You know sister – we have moved passed that

Then why bitch about the mess?
You are a High Queen in training
Put on your grown-ass woman panties and address your shit
Sekhmet’s feline roar can be heard in Hatshepsut’s brush up

As a child Hardliner yearned for good hair
What is it about black folk and hair?
Before the freaking Plantation there was no
Good hair versus hard hair
The fact is Hardliner was born with Congo kink
And up to this very day – she gets pressure
For expressing this beautiful and versatile gift
In the form of dreadlocks by her own sister friends

As you said there are a lot of sister women
Who still keep their inner slaves

That is why Hardliner gon break this self hate pathology
Her child will know of Africa – the good
The bad – and the really jacked up!
Cause already her kid has brought some mess to her
About some big head boy telling her that she is too black!
Hardliner will be dayumed if her daughter goes through this shit
The thing is that most black folk
Have not reconciled with the plantation
And do not know about Africa before the Middle Passage
They hold on to that epitome of beauty – the soft long hair
And light skin fantasy – closer to their chests than their freedom papers

She understands that shoudda – coudda – woudda is useless right now
Knowledge and pride about Africa’s greatness
Aint gon heal the wounds of inadequacy
Cause so often – the blackest Pan-Africanist
Reserves all his love for white women
And the truth is black folks who make negative
And hurtful remarks about their own ethnic kin
Carry the weight of their issues in relation to
Their place in the colour spectrum of blackness
Hardliner stops for a moment – taking in the ah ha that just hit her dome
Hatshepsut eyes smile – as she witnesses that rising dawn within Hardliner

It always comes down self acceptance
Everybody wants to be validated and accepted for who they are
And if they do not match up to a certain standard
That is accepted as the norm by society in general
They strive to be close to it as possible
Disassociating themselves with any notion or perception
That they fall short of this standard
To the extent of rejecting the very fabric that they are made of

There you go Hatshepsut congratulates her victory

Hardliner thinks of all those sisters who would go to any lengths
To become a black Barbie to keep a job
Hold on to a man
To numb the pain of not being feeling beautiful enough

Not being white enough
Hatshepsut slices deep – right down to the bone
And Hardliner winces as she pulls up childhood memories
Of covering her head with a towel to pretend
She had long hair like a white girl
And Ms. Diva would put on a show – dancing in the living room
Watching the towel flow and fall about her shoulders like
She was one of her many Barbie dolls
From her shadow on the living room wall
That slice cuts a bit deeper as she acknowledges
Her own daughter’s desire for long princess hair
When she does the very same dayum thing
Humph – karma aint no joke

It is time to shed the hang ups bequeathed to you
By your inner slave sister
Only then will you sit on your throne in authentic glory

Yeh – she is blessed with an abundance of melanin
At least she can take comfort in the fact that
She gon age well!
Barbie’s skin don’t look fly at all when old age hits
Bouya!

Sister – getting over your colourism woes
Means arriving at and moving past the place of forgiveness
Hatshepsut counsels

Hey – there aint no haterism mama
A fact is a fact – melanin is useful to have when
A woman hits 3 sores and ten
All jokes aside Hardliner has arrived at the conclusion
That for colourism to die among her people
It needs to be attacked on the personal level
Black folks need to take a look at their deep down dirty
Going on their own personal journey within
Which involves forgiving Massa and their inner slave
For planting racial self hatred into their DNA
A person has to strip all the negative racial stereotypes
From their psyche – arriving finally to accepting
Their organic being – who is made
In the likeness and image of the Great I AM
Knowing this – they are bound to the truth that
They are enough as they are and do not need to reflect
The image of beauty as decreed by any outside force
Only then will they be prepared for the shit
Coming their way based on the colour of their skin
And it will come – cause racism is alive and kicking today
Despite the progressive strides being made to become
A more open and tolerant society

Now that is her two cents on the issue
She aint no psychologist or sociologist
That is just how she breaks thangs down
With grown-ass panties on and all –
Sista gurl is cool with her Congo kink
She is cool with the fact that most likely
She would have been a field slave
When the thunderous freedom drums peeled
She would not have second guessed revolting
Mammy on the other hand – would have pulled a nigger run
Like the house slave she was – to squeal everything to Massa
That is thing with those high yellas
Running away from their blackness with a superiority complex

“You running and you running and you running away
But you can’t run away from yourself”
Yes I Mr. Marley
Cause at the end of the day – to a racist – a nigger is a nigger

Find your forgiveness and compassion sister
You recount truths of slavery
Whilst your vengeful sword is hungry for blood

Hardliner acknowledges her anger and judgment towards the house slave
She also acknowledges his/her struggle for acceptance
In a world that refused to recognize his/her humanity
With self hatred being so deeply embedded within
The house slave simply did not know any better
He/she was in a constant state of survival

Hardliner is done with doing that – surviving
She is loving her sweetest berry black skin
And has come to realize when a person
Wears self love and acceptance like second skin
Even the most prejudiced of persons gats to bow down
Cause their spirit acknowledges a badass
Who has conquered his/her own insecurities
To arrive at that place where race aint an issue

Aside from that – she is fine as heyul
Aint that how you put tangs on your temple walls mama
“to look upon her was more beautiful than anything;
her splendor and her form were divine.”

Humph – that past life theory may not be so far off

That in itself is lesson sister
As you know – saying something is one thing
And believing it is another

Hardliner assesses the Queen – her eyes aglow
Her gaze penetrating sista gurl’s core
Hatshepsut is a badass – but she is scary as shit!