Racism is not that you treat us differently. 
It is that you pretend we are the same, 
refusing to acknowledge our differences.

It is that the learned among you pretend to study us, 
as if we are to be studied,
rather than learned from. It is that the ignorant among
you are more honest in their hate towards us;  
for who we are,
rather than your indifference for who we could become,
all the more because of it. 
It is that you pretend to let us
speak in small, 9 by 16 frames, 
if it can fit the length of a gunshot. 
You let the numbers grow so that you can tell the world
you see us, you hear us, you let us speak,
as long as we do not say too many phrases at any one time,
or sing any songs with words like river, Palestine, to, or the sea.

You let us roam in protest for hours in a day, 
surrounded by security for your protection, so that
we cannot break the line of sight from your networked broadcasts, 
and your world sees us for who we really are.
Not the fighters, not the families,
not the citizens, never the victims.

We are the free.  

At least with your racists,
we can tell where the shot is coming from. 
Before tomorrow buries us under your hypocrisy.

Fiko D has a doctorate in literature and political upheavals, centred on the recent Egyptian January 25 Revolution. He lives in London. His latest work is Trail of a Syllable is available on the University of Surrey research repository.