AFRICATOWN, USA

In the autumn of 1860, 

110 of them bound and chained together 

enslaved Africans from Dahomey into Mobile, with one person whose soul, so filled with song and sorrow, flew back home–

109 

brought their drums, 

percussion and repercussion 

the last survivors of the transatlantic slave trade in the United States.

They knew who brought them here 

In the autumn of 1860 

and spent the next century 

glaring in their faces while palming oranges at the supermarket

or sauntering past their sign in white letters: 

Africatown: founded by descendants of the enslaved people aboard the Clotilda

They stuck to themselves, 

I don’t blame ‘em 

If I knew who did this 

crime for which they were tried but never convicted 

knowing how they burned and deliberately sunk to destroy criminal evidence

I’d be aflame too. 

At least the drums still beat 

with the rhythm and the bass to know 

illegal transport of human cargo.