Good Dirt

by Charmaine Wilkerson

He couldn’t let anyone see that he was writing. It was one thing for him to carve the date or initials, despite the laws that barred people like him from writing. That might be risky, but it was another thing, entirely, to form a full sentence. This was to court danger in the most direct way. But as he drew a tool across the surface, Moses felt the ache in his soul dull slightly. Lord Have Mercy, Moses wrote, then mumbled the words to himself. Lord have mercy.

“The authorities want to keep the foreigners from wandering around town and spreading ideas of rebellion to slaves.” Old Joe said. “As if a slave who sails the seas with the permission of his master doesn’t have eyes and ears of his own. He’s a man, is he not? He has a tongue to tell stories of what he has seen and heard, does he not? He has a pocket sewn into his jacket. He can carry the printed word from afar, with news of how men and women live elsewhere.” Old Joe shook his head slowly. “They can’t tie up the mind with a rope, but they keep trying anyhow. So

He put designs on signs and wagons and buildings and such, and it brought him great satisfaction to know that the same compulsion to draw that once led Willis to be whipped as a child now provided a source of income.