landing on the empty trough out back.
She rustle her bright wings,
cock her head at me,
then that feathered hope make for the trees—
sweet-sweet-sweet-life-so-sweet!
singing at last,
like a yellow bird should.
according to Shad
T r a c k i n g T r u t h
Phoebe got herself in a heap of trouble now,
keeping her secret book from Master and me.
I stare at the fire in the curing barn,
blind to what’s right in front of me,
my mind tracking a trail of lies
running circles ’round that stump
where we had our secret kiss,
where she hid her secret words,
where I found those secret tools.
Did she know about the bag, too?
Should Master?
Maybe it’s time to tell the whole truth.
But Phoebe’s book wasn’t in the bag.
Maybe she isn’t part of the plan.
Surely she would have told me,
if she knew about Will wanting to run.
No. She don’t know nothing about
no dial or money, no gun or knife.
Heck, if Phoebe had a gun,
she’d likely shoot herself in the foot.
And if Phoebe had a knife, she’d—
my heart stop.
The scab.
The blood from stump to well.
I see her, then,
my Phoebe
at the end of the trail,
arm cut deep by the knife
dripping proof.
according to Phoebe
W h a t I H a v e t o D o
Wind whistles through the barn,
rattling dead leaves in the rafters.
Through the split board,
I see Shad shovel coal on the fire and sit back on a barrel.
I know then,
which one holds Will’s bag,
what I have to do.
Pitching pebbles, I rustle the bushes over yonder.
And just like I knew he would, Shad come skulking,
looking to catch who’s sneaking,
looking to make Master proud.
While he gone,
I slip in and open that barrel and snatch the bag.
But before I can bolt,
Shad’s footsteps crunch up the path.
I grab Shad’s shovel and scoop the fire,
heave embers into the bushels overhead,
then hunker behind the casks,
heart pounding as he come in.
Shad look at the shovel I left lying.
Look in the barrel I left empty.
Throwing down the lid, he look my way
and I’s left cornered as he step toward me.
A crackling-snap make him look up
to where smoky leaves whoosh into a blaze above.
And just like I knew he would,
Shad run for the rain barrel.
Bag in hand, I run, too.
Shad’s fate depend on them bundles.
Just like Will’s depend on this here bag.
I hope he understand.
I hope he forgive me, someday,
for what I have to do.
according to Phoebe
I D o n ’ t K n o w
Skirts hiked, I cut through the dark field,
leaves lashing at my legs.
But it don’t matter. If Master catch me now,
I be whipped worse than by tobacco blades.
Much worse.
I don’t know
if Will and the boys gonna be at Carter’s Corners.
Maybe they got scared when they saw their bag gone.
Maybe they decided not to run.
I don’t know
if Birdman gonna come.
Maybe Shad gonna tell.
Maybe Master gonna show.
I don’t even know what happens
after I bring this bag to Carter’s Corners.
I just know that I have to.
I stop at the edge of the field,
at the edge of my world,
scared ’cause I don’t know nothing about nothing
past Whitehaven’s fence.
But I think of Will and Joe and Davey and Levi
and I climb,
rung by rung,
swing my leg over
the fence
and jump down on the other side.
Heart racing,
I swallow,
take a step,
and another.
Each terrifying
one
taking
me
the
farthest
I
ever
been.
according to Shad
F i r e
Water splash up in the rafters,
killing that fire and the one below
to a hissing smoke.
Them burnt bundles ain’t nothing but wet mulch now.
I kick the coals and wonder if it worth starting another fire.
If there’s anything left saving.
I know it was Phoebe.
I seen her shadow running cross the far field
racing for the river, bag in hand.
I know what she did.
But I’ll never know why.
I had plans for us. Big plans.
But all them dreams gone up in flames
and I’s left alone.
Left here to put it out.
To pay.
Master oughta know. He gonna.
He’ll be some fired up,
but I’ll kindle that blaze,
’cause I think my brother and my girl,
they’s worth saving.
And when Master bring them back
and learn them a lesson,
maybe he can make them finally see sense.
Lord knows, I can’t.
according to Phoebe
T h e R o u t e
Shad fishes at Carter’s Corners,
so I follow the creek.
Sure enough, that winding water lead me
right to where the rivers meet.
But there ain’t a soul around.
Heart pumping, I move tree to tree
up to the crossroads,
scanning the ditches for their shadows.
Maybe they ain’t here.
Maybe they ain’t running.
Maybe I just burned bundles,
burned bridges,
for nothing.
A whole lot of maybes
but one thing’s for sure:
I’s in a mess of trouble.
according to Phoebe
C r o s s r o a d s
I could go to Master and confess,
tell him I’s sorry I been hiding my learning,
sorry I burned his crop of bundles,
sorry I walked away from Whitehaven.
Master might show mercy to his mulatto-girl.
But I doubt it.
If I go back,
he just whip me in ways that won’t show
when he sell me
away from Whitehaven.
I crouch at the crossroads
in a ditch of dread,
listening for men I can’t see,
wondering if a wagon gonna come,
knowing whatever I choose
takes me away from Whitehaven—
from what I know.
Too scared to go back,
too lost to move ahead.
I can do nothing but
cower in the dark.
according to Phoebe
B i r d ’ s E y e V i e w
What now, Momma?
Listen to the birds, she’d always say.
And she right.
Birds know how to build a home anywhere,
straw by straw.
Birds know how to forage and
feed
wherever they find theyselves.
But most of all,
birds know when it’s time to fly on.
How’d they know? I asked her,
as we watched a flock fly north.
An arrow in the sky.
The good Lord gave them will and wings to fly.
All they gotta do is
listen
and leap.
So I listen. But I don’t hear nothing.
Not even no owl nor whippoorwill.
The wood strangely silent.
And I smile then,
in the blind dark.
’Cause I know what birds know;
what they see;
why they’s silent.
Someone else here, somewhere,
hiding in the ditches,
Listening for wagon wheels,
waiting to leap.
according to Phoebe
W a g o n
A wagon come rolling up the road,
rumbling like thunder in the silence.
It pass where I huddle in the ditch
but it don’t stop.
A lone driver sit hunched over,
in his dark coat,
wide-brimmed hat hiding his eyes.
Them farmer’s clothes,
that smooth-skinned jaw,
don’t look like the bearded Birdman I know’d.
He haul the reins a ways up and stop,
listening.
I don’t know the signal.
But he’s not moving.
Nobody is.
Maybe he a paddyroller
patrolling at night to catch and punish
slaves on the loose.
Slaves like me.
according to Phoebe
T h e C a l l
coo-WOO woo-woo-woo
a dove echoes eerie in the dark,
shivering my spine.
I listen to its soulful song.
But mourning doves ain’t nightbirds.
You never hear them call, come dark.
Except for once ...
when I’s hiding in the tree.
coo-WOO woo-woo-woo
It call again—
and know it him.
It Birdman.
So I leap.
according to Phoebe
O u t o f t h e S h a d o w s
Four shadows creep outta the ditches next to the wagon:
Will and the others.
They’s there, just like them silent birds said.
I run up the road, sack in hand.
“Phoebe?” Will whisper as I draw near.
“What the hell you doing here?”
I hold up the bag as the men clamber into the wagon bed.
“She stole our bag!” Levi say.
I shake my head. But here I come, holding it.
“You tell on us?” Levi ask,
but it don’t matter what I say,
his answer thunders up the road behind me:
Master and Brutus,
armed and angry,
coming all hoof and hellfire.
according to Shad
R i g h t
She running for the crossroads, Master, I said.
That’s where they must be meeting.
Master heed me.
Haul me up behind him when I say,
I knows a shortcut.
Me and Master gallop through the dark,
alongside Brutus.
Shackles clanking in saddlebags.
Guns cocked.
Ropes wrapped and ready to haul them home.
And as we round the corner I see
Will,
the wagon,
and Phoebe running red-handed to meet them.
“Well done, Shadrach!”
Master say the words I long to hear
as he spur his horse on.
“You were right!”
Only this time,
it don’t feel so good to know it.
according to Master
U n d e r e s t i m a t e d
She’s running for the wagon,
as it pulls away,
men cowering in the bed.
I never knew the dumb girl had it in her
to read and write
to learn and lie
to burn my stores and steal my slaves.
A will of iron grit, she has,
and the wisdom to hide it well.
More Duncan than I thought.
More dangerous, too.
I rein in,
raise my revolver.
Hold her in my sights:
Ruth’s girl.
Mine.
I’ll do what I have to.
To keep order. To keep control.
I’ll shoot her in the back
before I let her sneak behind mine again.
according to Phoebe
R u n n i n g
I reach for Levi’s hand as I race,
hoping he’ll haul me over the sideboards.
But a shot explode behind me
as he take the bag.
And just like that,
Levi’s head burst
like a firecracker in a pumpkin
and he tumble out of the wagon.
Birdman’s horses surge ahead, spooked by the sound
and I keep running.
Running.
Running.
Even as
the drumming hooves and jangling chains
of Master’s men
come closer and closer.
I try not to hear them.
try not to feel the pain in my side,
the cramps in my legs,
try not to think of poor Levi
left dead in the ditch.
Else I’ll be next.
Will stretch out his hand,
risking his hide for mine.
“Come on, Phoebe!” he yell. “You can do it!”
Running toward Will.
Running from Master.
Running for my life.
Only I don’t know if I can run much longer.
according to Shad
O n e S h o t
My ears ring from the blast of his gun,
heart ringing with truth:
Master gonna kill them.
He ain’t looking to learn them lessons.
It revenge, plain and simple.
And I wonder if that why I’s here, too.
“Take them!” He give me the reins,
hold his gun in both hands,
steadying himself as he look down the barrel
at my brother
reaching for my girl’s hand.
Master cocks the hammer.
If he shoots now
he can take them both with one bullet
before they run away from me
for good.
One shot
to stop it—
is all I have.
And I take it.
according to Shad
T a k e t h e R e i n s
I pull back on those reins
with everything I got.
Master’s horse wheels hard left
just as Master about to shoot.
I pull the reins.
Master take his shot.
And Brutus, riding on our left side,
take that bullet
right to his chest.
Right to his grave.
according to Phoebe
E n o u g h
Birdman’s horses race ahead at the crack of the gun,
pulling Will’s fingertips further and further from mine.
I push from my toes.
Pump with my arms.
I reach with all I got left in me.
But all I got
ain’t enough.
Tripping,
I tumble
to a
stop.
Sprawled in the middle of the road,
scuffed, scraped, and
grazed by gravel,
gasping for air and heaving with heartache
in the wagon’s wake of dust and pebble,
I watch it escape—
without me.
according to Phoebe
K i c k i n g t h e S t a r s
Master’s horse rears up on the road behind,
front legs kicking,
grasping at the stars
as it whinnies and falls back
on its riders—
on Master
on Shad.
The horse get up.
But no one else do.
according to Phoebe
B r o k e n
I run for where Shad lie
broke from the fall,
his legs all bent in ways they won’t,
his head, too heavy for his neck.
’Minding me of that baby bird
all feeble, frail, and flung from its nest.
“Phoebe?” he say, voice cracking,
like his heart more broke than his bones.
“Why you leaving me?”
And I look at
my friend Shad,
through all the secrets and betrayals
that come between us,
to where he lie—
gun on one side.
Master on the other.
according to Phoebe
W i t h in R e a c h
Master struggles to his feet.
He can’t walk on that broken ankle
but that don’t stop him from hobbling closer.
I step away,
out of Master’s reach,
and look back
at the wagon long gone.
“She’s going to bolt, Shadrach.
I see it in her eye,” Master say,
all grimace and grit as he shuffle toward me.
“Get the gun; hold her for me.”
And Shad,
my Shad,
do.
He pick up the Master’s gun next to him.
He cock the hammer where he lie.
He turn that black barrel on me,
the girl
who lost him his brother;
who cost him his legs;
who broke his heart.
“Don’t move,” he say to me,
The Gospel Truth Page 10