THE STORIES OF BLACK MEN: HOW TO GET FREE

Manumission Papers for ex-slave Nathan Johnson dated 1859 just two years before the American Civil War began.

To Get Free

so, i set out to empty the prisoner in me,

sought to un-tame my shiftless complicity,

and i found it helpful to remove all blame upon the past,

understanding how periods of despondence tend to cast guilt upon dreams that evanesce too fast,

on schemes whose theories linger far longer than their inspiration lasts,

but seriously,

i wondered how long it would take for me to get free...

should i loosen the amber’ed coatings sealing me in,

mining my release… as if to become absolved of prior sins,

as my spirit thrusts clear of captivity, its fire renewed,

aware that this world would soon change its mood… enslaving me again; I would feed my soul with more incorruptible food, the grains of eternal harvests, a draught that god himself had brewed,

heroically as such guilded strategies boast, banking on inferences they lack the pennies to preclude, i must conclude that to doubt them would be tactically rude,

yet honestly,

i questioned how I could ever, really stay free…

in the end, i recognized the interstice that troubled me,

was just a question of my faith balanced gainst the spectre of calamity,

and I found it simplest to let the universe decide,

after all i was already in it for the ride, with no more mysteries to hide,

my options opened-up before me clear and wide,

and honestly… within me,

i had the power to get free…

By BIGDADDY BLUES

Manumission Papers for Samuel Barnett from 1859

AFTERWARDS: Black men enslaved in America could only be recognized as free with papers of manumission which they were compelled to carry with them at all times. You can imagine the precarious nature of such an arrangement when circumstances were not legally stacked in their favor. Should their papers be lost or stolen there was an immediate predatory culture ready to steal them back to enslavement...