Poet Jasmine Mans honors the fierce determination and courage of Harriet Tubman and her brethren in their mighty struggle for equality.
LIBERATION: Poetry Films Inspired by Harriet Tubman is a powerful series of short films inspired by the legacy of Harriet Tubman, in celebration of the new Harriet Tubman Monument in Newark.
Poem Written & Performed by Jasmine Mans
Directed by Yuri Alves
Produced: Igor Alves
Director of Photography: Gabriel Kurzlop
Sound Recording: Victor Buitrago, Andre Marques
Edited by: Yuri Alves, Victor Buitrago
Colorist: Gabriel Kurzlop
Assistant Editor: Andre Marques
Sound Design: Alexandre Ajuda
Post-Production Assistant: Gissel Romero
Production Company: DreamPlay Media
LIBERATION: Poetry Films Inspired by Harriet Tubman
Special Thanks: The City of Newark – Division of Arts and Cultural Affairs, Express Newark – Community Media Center, Shine Portrait Studio, Rutgers University-Newark, The Newark Museum of Art, Newark Public Library, Newark Arts and the Greater Newark Conventions and Visitors Bureau.
Made Possible By: The Harriet Tubman Monument Project, funded by The City of Newark, New Jersey, Audible, Mellon Foundation, and supported by local residents in partnership with Newark Arts, The Newark City Parks Foundation, The Newark Museum of Art, Newark Public Library and DreamPlay Media.
For more: visitharriettubmansquare.com
#LIBERATIONFILMS #HARRIETTUBMANMONUMENT
About Jasmine Mans
Jasmine Mans is a Black American author. Her poetry book, BLACK GIRL, CALL HOME (Penguin Random House) has been named one of Oprah’s Most Anticipated LGBTQ Books, Essence’s #1 Contemporary Black Poet To Know and has won the Stonewall Book Award, Best Poetry By The American Library Association Black Caucus, and Best Book Cover 2021.
Follow Jasmine Mans at instagram.com/poetjasminemans
TRANSCRIPT
Freedom wasn’t just a riddle
but a map clutched by stuttering hands
And a heart that never knew freedom
But 5 loaves of faith,
A landscape, and pathway
With uncertain roads
and waters often known
to betray its own.
Harriet,
Both pistol and porch light.
Woman who played heads or tails
With liberty and death.
Who gossiped about freedom
And nerved herself an unwavering imagination
With feet fumbling in a direction unknown
But up North
To the sound of a slave’s heart beat, and feet,
whose only job was to carry.
With an audacity foreign
to the tongues of Black folks
But a taste thick enough to stay
After all has been ate
Talked about sovereignty
Like it was owed to her
In a way that would make folks feel
like they’ve outgrown the copper
and midnight of slavery,
Gripping the rags and questioning their own alive-ness.
Knew that the compromise of humanity
Was unconstitutional.
Thought you to be unworldly
Even foolish to think
That freedom held its own coordinates,
That faith was something to be found, and followed
That Black folks had a resting place
near liberty.
With pastures and impenetrables.
That families could forge a freedom
That they did not yet know.
Taught us that faith
Could turn a fugitive free.
And when someone said
they were coming back for you
They meant it,
That
The last names we gave ourselves would never
Be counterfeit.
you gave out train tickets to Freedom,
and told us that the only cost to board
was to want it.
Was to believe it would arrive.
Even when it wasn’t on time.
Made them wonder if God
Could part them a Red Sea
And if not
maybe He’d trouble them a Chesapeke
And to covet this sacrifice
would mean their children
would know these pastures
In the hereafter.
With a promise that they would go in
But nothing would ever come following after.
DREAMPLAY FILMS
Original, award-winning narrative and documentary films.
