Poetry.............Slavery was a hard time, not a happy time

by Lerone Bennett

The slave trade was people living, lying, stealing, murdering and dying.

The slave trade was a Black man who stepped out of his hut for a breath of fresh air and ended up, ten months later, in Georgia with bruises on his back and a brand on his chest.

The slave trade was a Black mother suffocating her newborn baby because she didn't want him to grow up a slave.

The slave trade was a kind captain forcing his suicide-minded passengers to eat by breaking their teeth.

The slave trade was a bishop sitting on an ivory chair on a wharf in the Congo and extending his fat hand in wholesale baptism of slaves who were rowed beneath him, going in chains to the slave ships.

The slave trade was a greedy king raiding his own villages to get slaves to buy brandy.

The slave trade was a pious captain holding prayer services twice a day on his slave ship and writing later the famous hymn, 'How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds.'

The slave trade was deserted villages, bleached bones on slave trails and people with no last names.

The slave trade was Caesar Negro, Angelo Negro and Negro Mary.