He could not even look at him…

I write to speak my truth, but a picture-you know the drill.

Trump couldn’t even look into the eyes of President Barack Hussein Obama. All he could do was apparently look at his brown hand. Both have pursed lips, not saying what this country is embodying and that is pain.

Pain from the women and girls  who are having their religious scarves ripped off their heads by racists –

Pain from the cries of the family of a Saudi student beaten to death by his white American “friends” in Wisconsin

#hehasaname Hussain Saeed Alnahdi

pain from women of color being called Nigger and having cups of spit thrown at them in parking lots…

The pain that Trump has brought on by inflaming the racist, xenophobic,homophobic, sexist parts of the American psyche has just begun to be felt and embodied.  All of these communities will need to band together in the coming four years to support each other and fight the onslaught of legal attempts to put us back in the kitchen, the fields, the closet, and out of the country.

Know this:

Your fears are real.

Do not let any white person tell you to calm down, or its not going to be that bad.

Practice self care whatever that is for you. I have prescribed some remedies here:

How do we breathe?

Trump could not look at Obama in the face, because he knew what he did to get into the White House, he knows what he has said about people of color, and he knows what Obama has done to protect those communities that Trump has literally rallied against.

The look on the face of President Obama breaks my heart, because once again here is a person of color who must act graceful and be civil to a white person who doesnt even have the credentials to be in the same room as him, let  alone replace him at his job. How often do we have to do this as black men? We must be gracious to a white person who has no place even walking into the room in terms of experience, credentials, talent-nothing. This is the height of white privilege here, the fact Trump got here in the first place.

Stay strong.