The power of a people reside in how they tell their stories. For descendants of slaves, African Americans, we don't have many written records of the powerful stories our ancestors. The voices of those whose blood courses through our veins were effectively silenced by the system of chattel slavery. Slavery isn't even something we as Black people want to talk about; it's something we want to place in its own little compartment and reference it when we're talking about racism and put it right back the second we start to feel pangs of inferiority and shame. Yet, there were true tales of survival, triumph, fortitude, enduring love, and even lust that slaves shared that have gone untold for centuries. This is one such story.
E'ry night, I gotta sneak out 'n tend to my man. He taint none uh my husband on paper cuz ole Massa says niggers not 'posed to get married legal 'n all like de white folks but we jumped de broom under de full moon so I says we's married. Maw says it too so dats good 'nuf fo' me. Adam, dats mu husband's name, like in da bible, like de first man dey ever was. Dat ain't his real name. His real name is . . . well . . . I cain't say it outside ma head cuz it don't be 'lowed fo' slaves to have no name lessin' a white person give it to ya. Adam is big 'n strong 'n black as midnight. He stands tall as a tree and his arms be as big as a canon. His eyes is dark and sad, you kin see de sadness in 'em like when he be lookin' at sumtin that don't be dere. He say he be memberin' his real home, his real kin folk. He's smart cuz on de boat over here, da captain learned him to read 'n write 'n do figgers but dis here Massa don't know nuffin' bout dat.
Dey call me Margaret on dis here plantation. When I's a little girl, I had anuva name but I don't reckon what it was no mo'. I jest member dat when I come here to da McKinley Plantation in Latta, SC, ole Misses say she don't like da name I come wit so she change it to Margaret. Sometimes, 'n my mind, I pretend like I's Eve 'n he's Adam like in da Garden a Edun 'cepin Massa say ain't no niggers in da bible. I don't be carin'. Sometimes, I closes my eyes 'n sees us runnin' around all free 'n happy like. I's scurred o' snakes sumtin fierce in real life so I don't eat dat dang apple in my mind's eye, we's just be free 'n happy . . . free 'n happy.
See, me 'n Adam was runnin' fo freedom when da catcha's dun snatched us up in some place called Louisville. Folks say we wuz almost to freedom iffin we wasn't catched. T'was my fault we got catched. I had my moon flow 'n we was in de woods 'n I didn't have no cotton to swab up de blood so we jest walk 'n walk 'n walk most de night 'n durin' de day we hide. All de time we wuz walkin', I was leavin' a trail for dem ole dogs to follow. Adam dun tried to carry me but he was too tired from walkin' all dem nights. I tole him to leave me be and go on but he wouldn't. Dem ole hounds caught de smell o' my blood 'n tracked us 'n catched us right on up 'n brought us back to here to ole Massa.
