Tag: Harriet Tubman

Freedom Calls (Commemorating Harriet Tubman’s Promotion to Brigadier General in the State of Maryland)

By Ellen Girardeau Kempler

Flying camouflaged
after nightfall, Harriet Tubman
mimicked the barred owl’s call,
signaling safety to fugitives
shadowed in darkness,
transmitting hope like
a firefly in the forest.

It’s no wonder
she chose to travel on Sunday—
the master’s day of rest—
when no press would post
wanted notices for runaways.

Following the North Star, she listened
for God’s guiding voice, led followers
through Maryland and Delaware
to Philadelphia—then up to New York,
singing, “I’m on My Way to Canada”
as they crossed the Niagara.

Through it all, she repeated
this refrain: “If you are tired, keep going.
If you are scared, keep going. If you are hungry,
keep going. To reach freedom, follow me.”

With every journey, she doubled back—
rescuing 70 souls in 13 trips. The Underground
Railroad fueled these escapes—hiding fugitives
by day, so they could fly by night.

In these precariously United States of 2024,
the General finally received her rank
for service to the Union
in our only civil war.

These anxious nights, whenever I hear
the owls’ questioning whoos or catch
the whoosh of swooping wings,
I think of Harriet, marshalling her troops.

Ellen Girardeau Kempler’s award-winning poems have been widely published in Wild Roof Journal, Mindful Poetry Anthology, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Narrative Northeast, Writers Resist, Phoenix Rising Review, Gold Man Review, Orbis International Poetry Quarterly and many other small presses and anthologies. Her first chapbook is “Thirty Views of a Changing World,” (Finishing Line Press 2017). Her second chapbook, “Fire in My Head / Flame in My Heart: Poems for the Pyrocene,” is forthcoming (Kelsay Books 2025).

Photo credit: David Hoffman‘s photograph of Aaron Douglas’ painting, Harriet Tubman, via a Creative Commons license.

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Slowcookery

By Amy L. Bernstein

 

“Because when it comes to truly explaining racial injustice in this country, the table should never be set quickly” – Nikole Hannah-Jones, “What is Owed,” New York Times Magazine, 2020

 

I stand on the far shore of the fast-moving
Combahee River,
opposite the Collective,

afforded a distant glimpse through a lead-paned window
into a snug, low-slung house on the riverbank where

Barbara, Demita, Beverly,
Sharon, Cheryl, Margo, Gloria
are in the kitchen
crowded hip to hip
making dinner to please themselves

the roast has just gone in to
marinate in its juices,

the carrots and potatoes will grow
fork-tender

but not for hours,
not until the pan is bubbling

I see them drinking wine and dancing
slowly
the river moves fast,
conveying time along wet ribs

and the ever-echoing shots of Harriet’s raid

but inside the house,
all is marination

the womyn are steeped in life—
schooled and schooling others

they slip in and out of the
dining room,

setting the table for dinner
one plate cup fork knife at a time,

for nothing about this meal is
taken for granted,
handed out,
handed over

it is so-so-so not easy
yet will be savored
by them
in their own good time

as the Combahee parades
its flowing witness.

 

Amy L. Bernstein writes stories, essays, and poems that let readers feel while making them think. Her novels include The Potrero Complex, the award-winning The Nighthawkers, Dreams of Song Times, and Fran, The Second Time Around. Amy’s poetry has appeared in Yellow Arrow Journal, Loch Raven Review, Lost Boys Press, Parliament Literary Journal, Passaic-Voluspa, She Is Kindred, and elsewhere, and in an anthology chapbook, Baltimore, I (want to) Love You.

Image credit: “Through Forests, Through Rivers, Up Mountains” by Jacob Lawrence 1967, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C.

Editor’s notes:

Read about Harriet Tubman and the Combahee Ferry Raid of 1863.

Read the “Combahee River Collective Statement.”

A note from Writers Resist

Thank you for reading! If you appreciate creative resistance and would like to support it, you can make a small, medium or large donation to Writers Resist from our Give a Sawbuck page.