Before she first heard
The Oreo® cookie’s name spat
Like an insult
Before she even understood
How or why it could
Fill the air with acid crumbs
That burned and stung,
The name was just a cookie
And not a favorite.
She preferred Hydrox®
Which were less bitter,
Their center more moist.
This vanilla wafer girl
Who spoke out in innocence
To claim equal humanity
For a race not her own,
Before she knew there might be
A penalty for her innocence,
After, shunned
But not banished,
A vanilla slightly scorched
To a hurt of butterscotch,
She survived quietly
Though always watched
In the light of fires
That flashed through the sixties.
Much later in poems of recollection
In the voice of two races
She spoke aloud once more
But she was stunned
When a friend of the other race
Suddenly smiled and said,
“I can explain you now.
You’re chocolate inside.”
It was an honor
The vanilla girl never expected
Or even thought she’d earned –
To be the opposite of an Oreo.
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