Yellow Wife Quotes

“To survive this, I could not let my mind succumb to the misery that threatened to strangle me.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“You may choose to look the other way, but you can never say again that you didn’t know —William Wilberforce”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“Who could whip a woman until she lost her child? Only a monster.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“I did not know if I should be relieved by the gentleman’s kindness or frightened to death.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“kept my despair quiet, close to my heart.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“a grateful heart served as a magnet for miracles,”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“nodded, then noticed his eyes take in her slim waist and rounded hips. July’s hair was so thick and long that I implored her to keep it wrapped, but she was young and busy, and often forgot. I feared for her, and tucked her away with the children as much as possible. Beauty was a curse for a slave girl.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“I would like to see her up close,” a large man called from the back. “Very well. Step down and follow the gentleman.” Matilda stepped off the platform with her dress still in her hand. She caught my eye before following the man into the side room. My heart sank. She had just lost a baby, reconnected with her husband, and was now being taken advantage of by a stranger, for no other reason than that it was his right, and she had none.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“Mama always said the way to keep peace with white folks was to be available and invisible at the same time.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“In my sorrows, Lord walk with me In my sorrows, Lord walk with me When my heart is aching, Lord walk with me.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“We cannot educate these niggers, lest they forget who the master is. Guessing that is what happened to you.” He stroked my cheek. I tried not to flinch. Then he had his hand around my neck and was crushing his lips into mine. I could feel his manhood”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“Oliver Twist, my friend deep into the night, helped me to cope.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“This here is a black walnut tree. Grow deep in the woods, so you gotta know where to look. Cure for most everything. Ever unsure, come seek this tree.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“You may choose to look the other way, but you can never say again that you didn’t know”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“A grateful heart served as a magnet for miracles.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“Whenever I started feeling as if I could endure this place, there was always a reminder that I could not.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Don’t let your heart be troubled and be not afraid.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“As long as there is breath, there is hope.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“In the front pews, upper-class whites, dressed in the latest fashions, sat together, with additional white men stationed in the corners of the room and along the back wall, watching.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“You a slave in name, but never in your mind.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“And you have no idea what surviving has cost me. My bruises might not
look like yours but they are there.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“...a grateful heart served as a magnet for miracles.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“a grateful heard served as a magnet for miracles”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“no kind deed from a white person went without a return.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“No respectable man would marry his daughter off to the owner of a slave pen. Even though [Lapier] is wealthy, high society southerners consider traders dishonorable, call them the pariahs of men.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“Even though white men do not consider us women fully human, they cannot stop lusting for our flesh… Rest assured, you are his prized yellow wife.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“From these women, I discovered that Richmond was second to New Orleans in the slave trade and that there were several jails, holding pens, and auction houses similar to ours scattered within a few-block radius. As the evening progressed, Anne shared”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“Negroes could not gather, not even in broad daylight to hear the word of God, without being watched.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“My hand dropped down to my belly. Mama had told me to watch myself. Not to bring no slave babies into the world. How could I let her down? I had stumbled and now I did not know how to feel.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife

“The scene transformed from beastly to boisterous in the blink of an eye.”
― Sadeqa Johnson, Yellow Wife