Golden Brown Skin

By S.C. Says

The first collection of poetry by spoken word artist S.C. Says, dealing with his journey with mental health, surviving depression, on being bi-racial, navigating family and relationships, and finding God.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Write About Now Publishing
• Release date: Sep 1, 2022
• ISBN: 9780990612711

S.C. Says

Andre Bradford, a.k.a. S.C. Says, is an Austin based slam poet & speaker who has been writing & performing spoken word poetry since 2013. His one-man slam poetry show on empathy called Kintsukuroi has toured & featured at venues, schools, universities & conferences across the country. He is a two time Austin Poetry Slam Champion, The 2022 Grand Slam Champion, & he also once popped a bag of popcorn without burning a single kernel which is arguably one of his greatest achievements. For more of S.C. Say's work head to www.scsayspoetry.com.

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GOLDEN BROWN SKIN

S.C. Says

Copyright © 2022 by S.C. Says

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmited in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the author.

Editing & Typesetting: M.R. Chibbi Orduña

Associate Editors: C.L. Rooster Martinez, Madison Mae Parker, Amir Safi

Cover Art: Paulina Carretero & Troi A. A. Speaks

Cover Design: Morgan Williams

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022913310

Published by:

Write About Now Publishing, Texas, USA

www.wanpoetry.com | @wanpoetry

Print ISBN: 978-0-9906127-0-4

Ebook ISBN: 978-0-9906127-1-1

Printed in USA

If you are veiwing this publication as an ebook the publishers recommend you scale your font so that the text below appears on one complete line so that you may experience this book as it was intended.

Doluptate magnist fuga. Et aut la cus solent pre vent quisit, suntiun disquas aute ipsa sim rersperitas autie.

WWW.WANPOETRY.COM | @WANPOETRY

for anyone who has wanted to share their story,

& for the people who hold space for it

CONTENTS

In the beginning

Crayon Box

A Kindness

At A Glance

God’s Math

Dwarf Planet

A Survival in Parts

you can dying star on your own time

My Father’s Poem

Magic Poet

For Chester

Yes // No

Black Party Rules

First Language

Sneezing is like Racism

Unnatural Disaster

Black is Beautiful

Sound Like Jazz

This isn’t an S.O.S

Inheritance

Intoxicating Interruptions

I Hate Being Single

Write it with Me

The Light of His World, the Light of His Heart

Unplanned

In the beginning redux

Addendum:Starting in the middle

From Everything in Me, Thank You

IN THE BEGINNING

there was a word

& I knew it.

I did.

It was

(it was)

it was on the tip of my– spine

I just couldn’t reach it.

Hold it.

I wasn’t ready yet.

My tongue

taught me trauma tastes like time,

like oversaturated seconds sold

spent hating how my tears triggered talks

about trying to keep it all in.

Perspective

is God’s way of telling the same story

with different endings.

I didn’t end

but God I wanted to

be over with,

become less body/

more epitaph.

Here lies the effects of a cause not yet realized

but I realized:

caskets look like challenges to the dirt we lay them in

& the mud always wins.

We know this

(I know this)

Still we plant them

hoping the empty won’t sprout again.

(again)

I’m reminded

we used to play this game on the playground when I was a kid

where one person would make up a story

& we’d all play along as characters.

I guess I never really stopped playing the game

became the version of me most suitable

for background decorating,

afraid of the sad I’d see in solitude

sought out company at any cost,

& the price

the price was never really agreed upon.

I just know I paid it

in mirrors I didn’t recognize

a voice that didn’t sound like mine,

a smile you could see from the back of the moon

but never did quite reach my eyes.

I’m still searching for that word–

the one from the beginning of me,

the one that was on the tip of my

(of my)

shhh…

The show is about to start.

We planted our dreams

like mustard seeds

hoping the mountain

that grew there

would resemble the pictures

we saw on our screens.

While we waited

the wind was gently passing us by.

CRAYON BOX

My childhood consisted of a color palette

composed mostly of a lighter pigment

than my own.

If our life’s painting only consists of the colors of people

we put in it my painting

looked a lot like a newspaper lacking content.

As the only sentence on the page it wasn’t hard to stand out.

I tried to blend in

tried not to attract attention

for fear of being mentioned.

I changed

the way I dressed to seem less confrontational

the way I spoke to seem more agreeable

the way I breathed so as not to be too audible

but I couldn’t change my flesh

no matter how bad I wanted to.

Notice: I was always the Black friend

my friends’ parents were referring to.

Notice: it wasn’t necessarily me girls didn’t find attractive,

but the skin I was dressed in.

Notice: being mixed & being Black

weighs just as heavily

on the suburban scale of

normality,

realize what they meant

when they asked