WEBVTT

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These are the slave poems
that I wrote some time ago.

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And I'm going to read
about two of them for you.

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About 10 of them as you heard
are on a CD with music to them.

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And the two that I will
read to you, one of them

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is on the CD the other
one is-- and I think I'll

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say one of them to the last.

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But listen to this.

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I gave this assignment
to my students at Exeter.

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And it is called "Arthur
Mason Shopping List."

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It's 123456789 10,
11, 12, 14 lines.

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And when I gave it to the kids
they said, oh this is easy.

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This is easiest
assignment she ever gave.

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DO Kendrick gave
this 14 line poem,

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easy as I don't know what.

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So they took it and
back and read it.

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But listen to the
poem and I'll tell you

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what they said to me after they
came to class the next day.

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To market, to market.

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You know that little ditty
to market, to market,

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to buy a fat pig
is it, a fat pig.

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Home again, home again, jiggidy.

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You never heard that?

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I know I'm older than all of
you but anyway, as children.

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Have you heard it?

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OK.

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Arthur Mason Shopping
List November 6, 1804.

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One Black Angus, one ewe, two
hawks, one spinning wheel,

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one dresser mirror, one
nigger wench and child,

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pay no more than $2000.

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12 silver spoons, four teacups,
four sources, six China plates,

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one pewter teapot billed
to be paid in full to tide

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as Wellington 6th
of November, 1804.

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Now, they read that and
they thought it was a lark.

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They put it aside and they
told me, most of the students

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said, wait a minute
there's something in there.

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Let's go back to it.

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And they went back to it.

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They said, wait a minute
he's buying a human being.

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I said yeah that's
the point of the job--

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of the poem.

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That slaves were property and
that human being that nigger

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wench and child as he
stated it went along

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with the spinning wheel in
the hogs and the teapots.

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It's a statement on its own.

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I'm going to read a
poem called "Sidney

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Waiting for Her Mother."

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I think it's here.

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Yeah, Sidney Looking
for her Mother.

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And the other part of the poem
is while her mother waits.

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But I'll read Sidney.

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And she'll tell you who she is.

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She's a freed slave
and she'll tell you

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who she is as she talks.

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But sir, you made a mistake.

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Yes, sir.

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I can't be put on
the block no more.

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I'm free so here be my papers.

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I know I've got a brand
on the back of my neck

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as you've noticed, but that'd
be my first master because I

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ran way too much.

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But my new master
gave me my freedom

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and my mistress packed a
big basket full of food

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more than I could eat
enough for three people

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and gave me money
to take the train

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and go to my freedom
and my mother.

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Oh my mistress and master be
good people, Lord bless them.

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Now, please let me go.

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My mother is out there somewhere
and you detained me unlawfully.

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Do you understand
the paper, sir?

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Can you read?

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And no offense, sir, but no.

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But the train for Austin
be here any minute

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and that'd be the place where
last I heard my mother was.

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I don't know how strong she'd
be if all these days of her

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motherhood before the
mothers of children

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without mothers though they
mothers be closing they rooms

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and they chatters and in
their dreams and playthings

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and all that mothering their
children all white and fragile,

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playing in the sunlight
with ease and wind

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beyond their faces
and they hungry cheeks

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and they fade sometimes
and they play and needs

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a kiss for their misery.

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All that mothering while mothers
sip and sip tea with their kin

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and talk about the beauty of
the magnolia or the rosebush

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or how expensive they
silver be and how much they

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pay for their woman
slaves when they

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be young and
childbearing and cheap.

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And sometimes they
mother a horse

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with tenderness and
affection, brush him daily,

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keep him well-fed, give him
a special doctor and weep

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when he's ailing.

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Oh mother they chatters
with friends and mother

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they fears and memories.

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I wonder, sir.

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I don't know.

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But I wonder if all that
mothering which my mother makes

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out of clay sometimes
hasn't muted

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her, made her solid invisible.

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But I must go please, sir.

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I must not.

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I must go and find her.

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And Austin is where
she is last seen,

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which means her strength be
there, her visibility moving

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throughout the land
like a moonbeam

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taking care of those
other than herself.

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She be my mother, sir.

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Do you recognize the
sound if not the word?

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Don't holler, sir.

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Please don't holler.

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I'm sick of hollering, so sick
it don't scare me no more.

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Ha, but your throat sounds
raspy and must be sore.

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Howling don't help any.

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Oh no.

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Do you hear it?

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The train becoming coming
and I'd be a passenger.

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The papers, sir.

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May I have them back?

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They simply tell that I'm free.

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Can't be put on the auction
block no more, you understand?

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This man here
standing next to you

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can look at them if you like.

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If you give them to him
please sir quit the train be.

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You understand now.

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Oh thank you, sir.

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Thank you.

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I thought you would.

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Hear be the train.

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I have one seat and my mother in
my lap, on my arm, in my belly,

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or my tongue through my
eyes, all that and more.

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She out there.

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I know it.

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God get me a seat and wonder.

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