JUNETEENTH 2013

I think of my mama
and the way she always
walked with dignity
aware that her neighbors
did not think she deserved
to be respected or loved
aware that her grandmother
was born a slave
that she wasn't too many
days away from the
lash or the dogs
that hounded her
kin who ran for
borders, for freedom
for the right to name
their children whatever
they wanted

I am resting in this moment
thinking of my Ancestors
of the women, especially
who bore the children of rapist
slavers, who bore the lash
for no good reason
except white people
who bought and tried
to own slaves were
cruel; I see my mother
living past the memory
of her grandmother's
stories, past the violence
that got past on

I learned to pray because she
remembered that nothing was worth
her dignity and she found strength
in the presence of God: "Dear God"
I can still hear her praying
and standing at the counter
in Arby's and walking away
as the girl, barely 18, thought
she could disrespect my mama
with no consequences

Valerie, she said,
you don't ever have to take
being disrespected. And
when you're spending MONEY,
the only color that counts
is "green;" if the people
behind the counter
don't remember that, YOU
remember. 

And every time she said
Respect yourself
and others will have to
I begin to believe her
that two years' late
on the notice of "Emancipation"
was just a detail that 
did not define people
enslaved in Texas
or anywhere else. Certainly
not in my life... Freedom
is costly and now, as I 
remember my mama
I think:

Freedom ought to be celebrated, no matter how long it takes you to know that it's come.

© Valerie Bridgeman
June 19, 2013