Under the Tulip Tree

by Michelle Shocklee

“You were sold because you looked at a book?” “Yes’m.” She took a shaky breath and turned away. “Mammy wasn’t allowed to come see me, not even to say goodbye. I’ve often wondered what that day was like for her. A white man in a wagon come the next morning. He had two men and a woman chained in the back already. I’ll never forget the look of despair on their faces. I screamed and fought when the overseer dragged me from the barn toward the wagon. Master Hall stood on the steps of the porch watching, that same troubled look on his face. I called for him to let me stay with Mammy, promising I’d behave. When his eyes met mine, I thought he might save me, but he didn’t. He turned and went back into the house.” She pressed her lips together and shook her head. “That was the day I finally understood about slavery.”

Frankie nodded and settled back in her chair. “I don’t like remembering the bad times, but the Lord has a way of using them to get you to where he wants you to go.”

She looked at each of us, smiling with glistening eyes. “I understood then. I understood what Mammy tried to teach me about God and his goodness in spite of us being slaves. I understood that the masters who beat me and sold me weren’t anything like God the Father. They was sinners, just like me. I understood that bad things are gonna happen in this world and that we’ll all walk through the valley of the shadow of death. But I needn’t live in fear anymore. The things I endured in my pitiful life as a slave didn’t mean God isn’t good or that he don’t love us.”