I Am the Diaspora

 "I am the Diaspora"

We Are the Seed and the Soil on this earth, first people created to permeated for greatness.

I am the echo of drums carved in Congo wood,
baptized in Mississippi mud,
a bridge between continents and contradictions
I am not from one land,
but from the scattered stars of many skies.

You see me and say “American.”
But my soul knows rhythms that never bowed to borders.
My skin, a patchwork of ancestry,
my tongue, a multiverse of stolen dialects
and survival slang.

They stole us
ripped roots from red soil,
dragged kingdoms across Atlantic storms,
and tried to turn gods into property,
royalty into cargo.

But we don’t disappear.
We transform.

From the cotton fields to corner stoops,
from hush harbors to Harvard halls,
we carved Blackness into brilliance.

We built this country with hands still bleeding
from the whips of its blueprint.

But not just here
Not just North America’s song, 

In Brazil, we live in the samba and the soil,
in the favelas and the fire,
in Candomblé prayers whispered with the names of Orishas,
still dancing despite the chains.

In Colombia, we are the beat behind the marimba,
the silent spine of the Pacific coast
Black skin in Cartagena
that the world tries to paint over with tourist gloss.

In Cuba, we are the clave,
the revolution in rhythm,
the soul in Santería,
the drum that never forgot the sound of home.

In Puerto Rico, we wear Taino and Yoruba in our veins,
Borinquén hearts
fighting for names, for breath, for being
in a colonized tongue.

And in Europe,
we live in the shadows of castles
that grew rich off our blood.
In France, we speak in creole and courage.
In London, we bring Wind-rush wisdom to the underground.
In Portugal, our story is buried under cobblestone guilt,
but we rise anyway—still glowing, still Black, 

In Asia we are the Samurai-still brilliance they can't gentrify.

Don’t forget us.
We are Afro-Latin. Afro-Caribbean. Afro-European. Afro-Indigenous, Afro Asian.

We are Afro's and Dread Locks, we are textures of hair that make you think more about who you really are

We are the diaspora in motion,
each of us a sacred return to a home stolen,
yet still carried in our spirit.

I am because We are...

America eats from plates we set, at the tables that
wear style we birthed,
dances to beats we brought from the motherland,
then tells us we don’t belong.

But I belong to many places
To the griot’s memory, to Yoruba flames, it traces
To rice fields in South Carolina
And rhythms in Rio
To London’s estates, Havana’s heat, and Kinshasa’s glow in Congo's sky
Where children trace their lineage with pride
Even if their last name ain’t the one their ancestors died with.

I carry Togo in my locks.
I carry Harlem in my walk.
I carry Bahia, Barbados, Birmingham,
Paris, Port-au-Prince, Panama City
In my bloodline and my breath.

Multicultural? Absolutely
I am multi-survived.
Multi-resurrected.
Multi-rooted like a baobab
That refuses to die,
Even in foreign soil.

The diaspora ain’t broken.
It’s dispersed divinity.
And we

We are the living archives of what they tried to erase.
Our culture? Rewritten.
Our traditions? Reclaimed.
Our joy? Resistance.
Our presence? Revolution.

So don’t ask me where I’m from
Like it’s a single place.
Ask me what I carry
And I’ll tell you:

I carry centuries.
I carry continents.
I carry the stolen, the sacred, the survived.
I am not just from here.
I made here.
We made here.
And we are still rising.

—✊🏿✊🏾✊🏼

“I am not African because I was born in Africa, but because Africa was born in me.” Kwame Nkrumah