1.
The biggest tree exists
to neither swing nor sway,
doesn’t wait for a strong wind
to emancipate it from roots,
to be turned into freedom papers
to be torn up by the master.
–
The swing was created by the master,
to exist until the limb snaps and
the sway of blood to earth
arises in a song of liberation,
that listens for the river,
follows the stream of scars
flowing down that no slave
can ever escape or runaway from.
2.
The river casts her gently onto the banks.
She vomits its water onto the soil
fearful the scent will call the bloodhounds,
the white man’s brown and black animal
bred to hunt the runaway slave.
She huddles and shivers in the rain.
–
She recalls her master’s words:
“Having a favorite slave
is like having a favorite pig.
One day you will have to
sell it, eat it and forgets it’s name.”
–
Which is the greater sin against God,
she wonders, suicide or slavery?
–
She feels the rising sun
filtering through her fingers
in front of her and knows
she will walk alone
100 miles to freedom.
The good friend of the slave:
The Angel of Death is at her back.
–
She will go underground
and her enemies
will call her Moses.
–
She will cast Araminta Ross,
her old slave name, onto the waters.
Harriet Tubman will be
forever her free one.
Her adopted children
will not be born
into the stink of fear
and running for their lives.
3.
She falls into a God spell
that allows her to find
a way for every black soul
to forge the river,
make each crossing a baptism.
–
She now knows that freedom
means losing love but
finding your greater cause,
that the price of freedom is
watching people die,
watching people live
and breathe unbounded air
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