Anonymous India Poems

It is not wrong to be white
and to have dreadlocks
you offend me not
Nor would it offend
...

Dear white America that appropriates just about anything,
You are just everywhere aren't you?
Prancing around Olvera Street in search of something "ethnic"
a bindi on your forehead,
...

Since the age of 9, I've been slapping my ace with fairness creams.
Every face wash a slap in the face because I was a skin tone that was ugly
My chest was too small for a girl who just hit puberty
And my skinny waist and unhealthy thigh gap was the only thing I wore confidently around
...

when they want the thick hair but not the thick eyebrows
when they want the ‘forehead jewel' but not the ‘dothead'
when they want the tan skin but not the darkest of night
when they want the third eye but not the perspective
...