Haiku And Tanka For Harriet Tubman By Sonia Sanchez

1
Picture a woman
riding thunder on
the legs of slavery    …    

2
Picture her kissing
our spines saying no to
the eyes of slavery    …    

3
Picture her rotating
the earth into a shape
of lives becoming    …    

4
Picture her leaning
into the eyes of our
birth clouds    …    

5
Picture this woman
saying no to the constant
yes of slavery    …    

6
Picture a woman
jumping rivers her
legs inhaling moons    …    

7
Picture her ripe
with seasons of
legs    …   running    …    

8
Picture her tasting
the secret corners
of woods    …   

9
Picture her saying:
You have within you the strength,
the patience, and the passion
to reach for the stars,
to change the world    …    

10
Imagine her words:
Every great dream begins
with a dreamer    …    

11
Imagine her saying:
I freed a thousand slaves,
could have freed
a thousand more if they
only knew they were slaves    …    

12
Imagine her humming:
How many days we got
fore we taste freedom    …    

13
Imagine a woman
asking: How many workers
for this freedom quilt    …    

14
Picture her saying:
A live runaway could do great harm by going back
but a dead runaway
could tell no secrets    …    

15
Picture the daylight
bringing her to woods
full of birth moons    …    

16
Picture John Brown
shaking her hands three times saying:
General Tubman. General Tubman. General Tubman.

17
Picture her words:
There’s two things I got a
right to: death or liberty    …    

18
Picture her saying no
to a play called Uncle Tom’s Cabin:
I am the real thing    …    

19
Picture a Black woman:
could not read or write
trailing freedom refrains    …    

20
Picture her face
turning southward walking
down a Southern road    …    

21
Picture this woman
freedom bound    …    tasting a
people’s preserved breath    …    

22
Picture this woman
of royalty    …    wearing a crown
of morning air    …    

23
Picture her walking,
running, reviving
a country’s breath    …    

24
Picture black voices
leaving behind
lost tongues   …