HATE

There is a word that my 5 year old niece doesn't know exists

It's something she doesn't battle with and it's never escaped her lips

It's a four letter, one syllable, simple word: HATE

Yet it carries so much historical, political, emotional weight

That 's shaped our beliefs, changed what we see, and made us envy

It's made us blind to truths, to find excuse, caused lies and abuse

So our minds can't choose, designed so we lose

Lose control of reality, lose trust, and lose ourselves

Like poisonous gas, it wraps around our lungs so we can't breathe or yell for help

So she asks me, what is hate?

It's made men turn on each other, cock the gun, and hold at gun point

It's made scapegoats so we blame folks for our faults while our fingers point

It's made innocent lives grow closed eyes while enclosed in a mask of lies

By making teenage girls cry because their body size will never suit your eyes

It's made us wish we were someone else

Forced us into plastic surgeries, erasing cultural history

An urge of ideal imagery, a burglary of our own identity

It's tricked us into believing that we're too fat, too ugly, and not white enough

It racially profiles and forced people to sit in the back of the bus

It's made men call women bitches who in turn call other women bitches

It's burned bridges to the point where we don't know which is wrong or right

It's made us colorblind, only seeing black and white

Planting racism and bigotry, promoting racial tensions and fights

Again, she asks me, what is hate?

Its taught 18 year old boys how to use a gun

While on the same fields stands 5 year old children who are taught to shoot someone

It's made victims of abusive fathers do the same to their own daughters

It's made men boost their masculinity by exploiting another's femininity

It's built glass ceilings, internment camps, nooses, and "not allowed" signs

It's raised narrow minded babies so maybe they'll never see past their own kind

It controls the media and schools through propaganda

Teaching us the enemy while we don't question or raise our hand up

Still, she asks me, what is hate?

It's caused school shootings, injustice, rape, and genocide

It's made innocent lives die and innocent mothers and wives cry

It screams of words: "FUCK YOU," "BITCH," "STUPID," and "HOMO"

It's what makes us laugh when we say "that's gay" when we know its wrong though

Its written Jim Crow Laws, Indian Removal, and Asian Exclusion Acts

It's enslaved our past while it engraves a cage in our path

It's made categories of inferior and superior

Making us wish for another exterior

Making us unable to look into the mirror

It's planted anger, depression, and fear

It's 500 years of slavery and oppression

Parents failing to give their children direction

It's confessions behind closed doors of elections, that politicians never mention

It's literacy prevention, no Filipino Veterano pension

It's stereotypes and 1-dimension, character inventions

All being fucked by White Supremacy's erection

So what is HATE?

It's something my 5 year old niece can't feel

For her it's a man-made social construct, so it isn't real

It's an empty word, insignificant, powerless, and nameless

Now I'm just waiting for the rest of the world to follow so we don't know what hate is

Let's no longer know what hate is!