DAY 18...The Journey:Our Civil Rights

The Journey

From Africa to South Central or Gibnut Street, Belize City

This is how we came!

Our Civil Rights

I was murdered

But like my brother says

What’s a cup of water

Taken from the mighty river

I hated that we were beaten down

But I was fierce in my pride…

Made to feel less

But I would not stand for it…

And I was willing to die for it.

And I did!

He shot me in the back

Coward that he was

But you can kill my body

My spirit lives on

My work will continue

In the hearts of my brothers and sisters

In the tears of my family

Writing liquid tracks

Down parchment faces

Etched with the truth of our days

And the pain of our nights

I was Medgar

But I live on…

Ella Wheeler Wilcox said...

There is no chance, no destiny, no fate,
     Can circumvent or hinder or control
     The firm resolve of a determined soul.
Gifts count for nothing; will alone is great;
All things give way before it, soon or late.
     What obstacle can stay the mighty force
     Of the sea-seeking river in its course,
Or cause the ascending orb of day to wait?
Each well-born soul must win what it deserves.
Let the fool prate of luck. The fortunate
     Is he whose earnest purpose never swerves,
     Whose slightest action or inaction serves
The one great aim. Why, even Death stands still,
And waits an hour sometimes for such a will.

DAY 17...The Journey: Arrival

The Journey

From Africa to South Central or Gibnut Street, Belize City

This is how we came!

Arrival

I was like a hot brand

Amid dried bush

My words burned everything they touched

Anger from my brothers

Hate from my masters

We sailed in on a gilded sheet

Smooth endless seas

We were washed in the salt from the sea

Glistened with the fat of pigs

And exchanged for gold

In my bowed head there was submission

But in my heart I stored rebellion

I am Nkule

Slavery

We were herded off the ship

Linked to each other by iron shackles

Forged with links of bitterness, anger

Resentment and hate

We saw the sun and

Did not feel its warmth

We were poked and prodded

And finally sold

Sold for our strength

Sold for our beauty

Sold for being different.

We planted cotton,

Sugarcane, felled logwood

Ate the crust of the bread

The skin from meat

And the guts of swine

We were slaves…

And we cried to be free

We were

Kunta, Shaka,Alunda

Ulele, Beriunga, and Keva

Later called…

Bobo, Sally and Mary Sue

An old man Ebednigo.

DAY 16...The Journey: The Middle Passage

The Journey

From Africa to South Central or Gibnut Street, Belize City

This is how we came!

The Middle Passage

I was daughter

The second child of a third wife

With little to offer and nowhere to go

I was taken from the Ibo people

From the edges of the empire

The fifth moon of my thirteenth summer

Spent 4 sunless days in a box of stone

Somewhere on the western shores

Then 114 sunrises on a sea house

Sick and starved

Beaten and abused

My father died

My brother was beaten and hung on the cross

By his neck

Milawe jumped overboard

Many more were lost

On the Caliente’s voyage

I survived to survive

I am Magwe 

DAY 15...The Journey: The Beginning of the Middle Passage

The Journey

From Africa to South Central or Gibnut Street, Belize City

This is how we came!

Africa

I was brought up in my father’s tent

In the warm equatorial nights

I learned at my nana’a knees

She knew all the words

That were laid by those that went before

I was a child of the tribe

I had summers of endless sun

When I would run with the wildebeest

Wrestle with Lion cubs

And do the dance of the gazelle

From this my childhood home

I was captured by the Asonde tribe

Who had fire sticks

Passed on to many masters and

Ended up in a slave ship…

I am Kunanbu Dae (A lost one).

DAY 14...I am being molded

HANDS

The rock on which I stand
is solid
built by soft mulatto hands
strong supple hands
that knead the bread
and tie the knots
and smooth the hair
hands raised up to sky above
and spread out fingers in easy love
hands that clasp in earnest heat
at stones stands
while all weep
hands that paint
my mood arousing
the ire of my groove
hands that cradle
my delicate need
for peace
to be known
as real.

DAY 13...Black Butterfly

BLACK BUTTERFLY

Ebonaceae, shimmery wing tips
slicing light
prismatic glimpses coming, going
that shows a path to the heights
an upward spiral

As you move sweet butterfly
I can follow by the music
of your flight song
the sweet bluesy medley
the hauntingly clear echo
of your earnest trial
to reach

Then there is the snap
a crescendoing clash
and like lucifer
plunging after the fall
with wings folded
as if in prayer
you spiral downward
and settle softly
to the ground
like thistledown

Sing Nina please
about going back home
and being free
and being released
sing for my
sweet
black
butterfly.

DAY 12...Transformation

This might be what I started as, but make no mistake this is not how I am living, nor is how I will end.


TRANSFORMATION

We begin as a rough
and will end as a gem
but between rough and gem
are
chippings
crushings
sanding
reshaping
firing
fitting
we don't always understand
appreciate
or want
the process
we may think it unfair
wonder why and question God
He allows it
He orchestrated it
I am fearfully
and wonderfully made
Made for this
to start as this
to go through this
I cannot see the end
we look toward the end
 and we cannot see it
and wish to be somewhere
in between
after rough
and before gem
right after beginning and
long before middle
So when the storm is raging
and chips begin to fly
from you fine ass form
from the brutality of the Process
and blinds your bestfriend
or cuts your sister under the eye
just remember
the gem He sees
in His hand
is already perfected
awaiting placement
in a finished band.

DAY 11...Hope

I cannot imagine what it must have been like...

We were herded off the boat in pairs, like animals been led from the ark, except this wasn't the promise land, at least not the land of our promise. After many moons on the floating box, with the rank odor of our fetid stink that could not mask the putrid funk of the barbarians that held us captive, we were grateful for land. They spoke in guttural barks and screeching snaps and I am sure they considered themselves civilized, but I could tell that most of them were unlearned. They lacked any of the accouterments of true breeding and carried themselves as brutish louts, with little understanding of true civility. As I stood in the sun and watched them knowing they thought me less, I thought them poor. As a leader of the tribe I was gifted with the insight into the souls of men and these people as they paraded around in their layers of cloth and overpowering perfume carried a darkness in them more malevolent than any seen before. Could it be that simply the color of their skin weakened the caliber of their mind?  How else could one explain the horrific foreboding that assailed me as I stood on the cusp of coming storm. Nevertheless, I knew that they would be surprised by the outcome, thinking us weak we would prove indomitable. Thinking us less we would prove more. Beating us down we would arise as ebony stars to guide a lightless world.

I actually can imagine what is was...but they could not have imagined the outcome!

HOPE

Hope is
the faint glimmer of sight
the promise of light
of revelation
of open understanding
of truth
behind clouds hidden now
but later revealed
It is not a know
or an actual drop
no water in the desert
it is the distant mist
a hint of moisture
where none exist
a longed for sight
now real
now true
I can touch you
I can feel you
I am
You are.


I love this clip from the Shawshank Redemption...no infringement of copyright intended.
HOPE...

DAY 10...Thoughts

Some people might say I think too much. It is the way I was fearfully and wonderfully made. When I think about the fact that I was made in His image:

One of my favorite Psalm, I have been meditating on this lately. It is giving me hope and challenging me to be more like Him.

Psalm 139

For the director of music. Of David. A psalm.

 ¹ You have searched me, LORD,
   and you know me.
² You know when I sit and when I rise;
   you perceive my thoughts from afar.
³ You discern my going out and my lying down;
   you are familiar with all my ways.
⁴ Before a word is on my tongue
   you, LORD, know it completely.
⁵ You hem me in behind and before,
   and you lay your hand upon me.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
   too lofty for me to attain.

 ⁷ Where can I go from your Spirit?
   Where can I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
   if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
   if I settle on the far side of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me,
   your right hand will hold me fast.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
   and the light become night around me,”
¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you;
   the night will shine like the day,
   for darkness is as light to you.

 ¹³ For you created my inmost being;
   you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
   your works are wonderful,
   I know that full well.
¹⁵ My frame was not hidden from you
   when I was made in the secret place,
   when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes saw my unformed body;
   all the days ordained for me were written in your book
   before one of them came to be.
¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts,^[a] God!
   How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ Were I to count them,
   they would outnumber the grains of sand—
   when I awake, I am still with you.

 ¹⁹ If only you, God, would slay the wicked!
   Away from me, you who are bloodthirsty!
²⁰ They speak of you with evil intent;
   your adversaries misuse your name.
²¹ Do I not hate those who hate you, LORD,
   and abhor those who are in rebellion against you?
²² I have nothing but hatred for them;
   I count them my enemies.
²³ Search me, God, and know my heart;
   test me and know my anxious thoughts.
²⁴ See if there is any offensive way in me,
   and lead me in the way everlasting.

MEDITATION

My meditation has been dark 

buried beneath layers of 

unsaid things and decorum

buried beneath years of 

unrelenting longing

burnt into my skin

by th heat of my own

silent introspection

my dark musing carry beneath them

the promise of hope

the hope of 

bringing those things not seen

into being.