anti slavery

[A] CAR- GOES with descendants

This poem was written in commemoration of International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition August 23, 2002 - As the International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition was recently celebrated worldwide , UNESCO continuous implementing its Memory of the World Slave Trade Archives project, one of its many initiatives related to the slave trade. I tried to show the links between the nexus of the human condition...

in Birmingham
on the rea banks
ambitious dissenters, zealots,
an’ metal workers
set to work without guild
near a ring
where bull deer
were reared
generations, centuries later
came Austin
wherever the car[here] goes
migrant workers never forget
bajan, kittian, Jamaican toiling
at longbridge…
nor scottish,welsh, english, polish, asian
irish peoples plying their trades
in the wake of the birth of an industrial heritage
is was and still is

going to B
uk’s first black city
taylor,sturge, wesley
would smile at lloyds
brindley’s glittering canals
more miles than Venice
never forget though
the nameless orphans
some offsprings of despised
canal-boat dwellers
except for those smuggled
to Canada for adoption
black country furnaces
ports of Bristol, Liverpool
cities like Manchester and London
unto guinea coast and
port royal xyamaca

(2)
cargoes
sugar coffee tobacco
rum molasses cotton
gold and ‘staple’ humans
shackled; 90% of this
trade orchestrated by mercantile
giants in Liverpool, Bristol
where also slavers, buccaneers and even privateers
recruited openly sometimes
in deception of those hired
there…everywhere
watts’ steam engines transferring
more than technology, trade

with
ever attendant greed
never before since cargoes
virgin vistas witnessed such
wanton pillage
man made flames
blood-letting
of innocent and guilty parties
on
all sides
slate from mountain tops of wales
ferried along worcester carnal
to trade with ‘de indans’
restraining irons…groating pudding
maize cutlery..pottery…
finery for the mistresses
nails, pig iron, coal, blankets
to trade with ‘de bandits’
paid for
by god fearing enterprising
forward thinking philanthropic scientists
who dared to query..

as albion Jacobins…lunar friends
Unitarian dreamers toying and fermenting
Sugar chocolate coated oats
Bullets, medals, coins
etal supporting far away
Harriet Tudman; listening
To discourses on
Equality, Dignity,
A human’s right to
liberty;
The likes of Equiano
Francis Barber
Peter Stanford- Methodist Minister
Isolating oxygen…colour spectrums
Hosting Jefferson an’ Small
Priestly’s timely hurried departure
To Pennsylvania heralded by
Loyalist riotous mobs on broad street
to ole’ moseley lands

----
[B] Descendants of CAR- goes
cargoes of edgewood carriages with
Birmingham flint guns blasting
american wars… asante kingdom. apache, chaka zulu,
fuzzie wazzie, nubian, karifuna,tasmanian, boer an’ biafrian
franklin, wesley and day
understood
abolition of this precious trade
and the consequences

Are these humans capable of “higher thought ? “
Among themselves these learnt men
Owners themselves of such chattel
Aware the booming “noble” slavery trade
of Boston & Maryland. Yankee slavers
plying their trade from Brunswick, New England
to Zanzibar despite
abolition decades prior
Cargoes
wanted posters proclaim
irish, welsh, english Scottish
indentured labourers…fellow Christians
albeit protestants, objectors and some catholics
on the run with afrikan slaves,,,
today in Moseley
handsworth, newtown (not guinea coast) an’ Aston
live multi racial
descendants drive cars
their familiar surnames
occupying
dwelling houses
whose facades have not changed…

© roi kwabena