Two babies born at a hospital.
One: person
The other…not exactly
Or not quite…
Seven pounds, six ounces of American…sort of.

Description: hyphenated
Married into a nation with a myriad of maiden names
And a history of arranged polygamy.
Where natives have unwillingly loaned out their names and given another.
Based on another person’s…”discovery.”

But this is about this baby
Who will be hated due to being equipped with the power to make the Sun kiss him on the cheek.
Skin labeled as a throwaway color
Unmentioned when reciting the rainbow.
Despite outside light paling in comparison to its glow.
This lump of coal that is more valuable than any Christmas gift.
Infantile diamond
The prejudiced English twist on a Latin word cannot hide the love language in his spirit.

This child.
This improper use of a fraction
The next leg in a relay race he didn’t sign up for
Yet has to carry his teammates to a finish line painted in dreams more implied than told.
He’s just “supposed” to know.
Heir to a forgotten throne
Son to forefathers briefly paragraphed in textbooks
And mothers whose beauty is minimized because it cannot be quantified.
Aunts and uncles who are afterthoughts 11/12ths of the year.
Reminded that he is only a part of this family crest by chance.

He could have easily been baby Number One had the stars seen it that way.
But they didn’t.
Through no choice of his own, he carries a namesake that has a perverted definition.
Teach him both halves of his description
All the struggle, moxie, and degrading adjectives he’s been gifted.
Show him he is a present, not an accident,
That he inherited a past all the way down to the ethnicity box he will check in the future.

Then, call him what he deserves to be called:
A person.

Peace.