Many black people left the land in search of an easier life. The swap wasn’t worth it. We got to big cities and realized we had less than we’d had before. The land was our hope, our guarantee that we wouldn’t starve. Once we left it, our lives were up for grabs. Cities devoured us whole. Drugs, unemployment, crime all took their share as we shook our heads at what we’d left behind. Now, most black kids across the nation have no connection to the soil at all. Their people escaped the country, believing they were escaping a life of toil. I understand that. I did that myself. But we lost the
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