A powerful portrait of a Black family tree shaped by enslavement and freedom, rendered in searing poems by acclaimed author Carole Boston Weatherford and stunning art by her son Jeffery Boston Weatherford.
Abram Alice Amey Arianna Antiqua
I call their names:
Isaac Jake James Jenny Jim
Every last one, property of the Lloyds,
the state's preeminent enslavers.
Every last one, with a mind of their own
and a story that ain't yet been told.
Till now.
Abram Alice Amey Arianna Antiqua
I call their names:
Isaac Jake James Jenny Jim
Every last one, property of the Lloyds,
the state's preeminent enslavers.
Every last one, with a mind of their own
and a story that ain't yet been told.
Till now.
Carole's poems capture voices ranging from her ancestors to Frederick Douglass to Harriet Tubman to the plantation house and land itself that connects them all, and Jeffery's evocative illustrations help carry the story from the first mention of a forebear listed as property in a 1781 ledger to he and his mother's homegoing trip to Africa in 2016. Shaped by loss, erasure, and ultimate reclamation, this is the story of not only Carole and Jeffery's family, but of countless other Black families in America.