Memories of my enslavement.

I really hope my writings aren't putting some off. It's just what I write about, it's what I know. This is about a little boy who happened to be born a slave.

I dread sun rise.

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Spanish moss hung from trees like the raggedy dress on that old hag from up the line.

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The swamp on the other side of the plantation always haunted me. Thick, bottom heavy cypress standing like sentries warned me of the dark places where a little boy could get missing. Many went missing in that swamp.

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The midday heat laced the air with what seemed like black strap molasses that stuck to a little boy like an old quilt; dense, heavy and inescapable. Something like ol’ miss’s eyes, she had hate in her"from birth.

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Cotton could be seen from one end of the Earth to the other or what was Earth to a little boy. A little boy also knew white meant nothing good, be it soft bolls of cotton or ol’ miss.

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As a little boy I was still in the fields along side grown folks, but I couldn’t work like them. Their lives depended on their work and their lives ended because of their work. I have seen with my two eyes how this work breaks people and makes them nothing more than hell spun cattle. The mind of a little boy could think of nothing but work and punishment. I had lost my before and never knew an after.

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On soft, slow half way nights, a little boy would often wonder what kind of god would allow this. Did this god hate Black people also? He had to, look at us. The people still called out to this god that could not see nor hear them. I asked this god that if you could hear me, to please strip this skin off of me so I could breath free air. A little boy driven crazy before he could stand on his own, only wanted to breath free air and if this god couldn’t do that then this little boy would leave him alone. As he had been left alone.

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I dread sun rise.

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A little boy has not known peace since he first opened his eyes, never know his mother either. She died with me tied to her back, in that midday heat shorty after giving birth to me. She’d given this world all she had. From that day a little boy’s life was not his, but the highest bidder. He saw his mother treated like a dead mule, kicked to the side so work could continue. That does something to a little boy and it did something to me.

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This little boy never knew his father at all. Like most fathers his job was to make as many little boys as he could. Little girls came, but where not wanted as much, just something to play with when they got ripe.

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My bones were made out of hate and fear and they fought often. Fear won most of the time as I can tell this story. On most days I was mad enough to chew nails and spit rust, but that meant nothing. Git yo a*s back in that field boy!!

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As a little boy I picked up on a few things. The others didn’t speak much during daylight, nor did they speak to anyone they suspected. A little boy had stop speaking before he speak good. He gotten all the talk beaten out of him one night for stealing some rotten ham from the dog’s bowl. The dog got some fresh ham to replace what I had choked down.

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As a little boy I knew that to stop this world from hurting me was to die. I had seen many people die and they didn’t want for anything after they stop kicking. Tight ropes didn’t swing anymore and empty stomachs didn’t crave. Tears stop flowing and that hardened face were now soft and full of peace. They weren’t hated and they didn’t hate after that rope was cut. They were put in the ground and a tree planted over top of them. That’s what I wanted for myself, but I was afraid to die because I didn’t know what was after that. Maybe that deaf and blind god would continue to be deaf and blind and let me stay in the cold ground. Much like now.