I used to dream of being chased by a man with a knife through a crowded market, but I realized that was irrational. That knife is now a gun, and that market is now my school.
I used to dream of falling eternally through an abyss, and I understood I was dreaming, but I still could never stop. When I awake, I see that the abyss is actually inequality, and I keep falling and falling and falling, but understanding that descent doesn’t allow me to ascend.
I used to dream of going to school naked, stripped of my layers and protection. Now I see my classmates as other countries, my clothes as America’s intentions, and my nudity as the barest comprehensible freedoms. We may require clothes like we preach freedom, but my clothes were stripped of me like our participation in the UN’s Human Rights Council. The very essence of who we are: our claims, our intentions, our values — robbed of us. Now our allies see what’s underneath, and they laugh at us like my classmates laughed at me in my dreams.
I used to dream of running, so I wouldn’t be late, but I could never go fast enough to catch the bus. Those black wheels kept spinning and pulling away from me like the respect I know I deserve, but will never catch. Like the bus driver knows to pick me up but doesn’t wait, reverence knows of my determination but seeks to find the white boy at the next stop instead.
I used to sleep next to my parents’ bed because I knew they could protect me from my fabricated illusions, but they can’t protect me from the bullets at school, the inequality through life, or the poverty many are facing.
I used to be scared to dream because of what my mind would create through the night, but now I’m scared to wake up because of how the world has changed in the course of a few hours.
I used to wake up to escape my dreams, but now I fall asleep to escape my nightmares.