Views and Mechanics Publisher's Note Editor's Note Review of Language and Mind Review of This Is My Best Review of Lost in the Void Crossword (Solution Posted in September. Printable version in pdf format of journal.) May/Jun Crossword Solution Creative Nonfiction Puttin' on My Pearls By Cathryn Braswell My Dinner with Gacy By Andy Martello Mysteries of the Shenandoah Valley By Casey Clabough Getting Lucky By Dale Purvis Poetry Your Mind and You Are Our Sargasso Sea By Lita Sorensen Midsummer By Lita Sorensen Windows By Lita Sorensen Simple Man By B.K. Birch The View from Here By Mary Hudock The Dinner Party By Ruth Mark Fiction It's in the Stars By Linda Gallant Potts An Intimate Evening with Papa By Lance Garrison Ballard The Prank By Terri L. Knight A Pocketful of Starflakes By Leslie Wolter Cover Art Photography by Seth Brown About the Contributors © 2006, River Walk Journal and respective authors and artists. All rights reserved. Do not use or reproduce without permission. River Walk Journal, Inc. Board of Directors Chairman - Elizabeth Ross Vice Chairman - Joseph Koch Secretary/Treasurer - Geri Stock-Ross Editorial Director - Patti Kurtz, DA Literacy Director - Bill Mausteller Policy Director - PA State Rep. Jess Stairs Advisory Board Chairman - Patti Kurtz, DA Asst. Chairman - Dan Lachenman, PhD Samuel Hazo Christopher Leland Edwin Yoder Joseph Bathanti Journal Staff Publisher - Elizabeth Ross Editor-In-Chief - Joseph Koch Sen. Fiction Editor - Patti Kurtz Sen. Poetry Editor - Neeldhara Misra Sen. Creative Nonfiction Editor - Brenda Coxe Contributing Editor - Robert Dittman Publicity Director (PA) - Geri Stock-Ross For information about submissions, visit http://www.riverwalkjournal.org/submission.html. Questions about promotions, subscribers' services, and advertising should be sent to publisher@riverwalkjournal.org. River Walk Journal, Inc. is a non-profit corporation run entirely by volunteers. For information about volunteer opportunities and internships, visit http://www.volunteermatch.org/results/org_detail.jsp?orgid=58479. |
Searching for Truth The fields were silent, only the humming of the hot wind against my ears. Clay and parched grass beneath my feet were the familiar Pennsylvania light tan and withered green. I knew that these fields had been a sickly brownish red close to 143 years ago, but if there weren’t so many stone monuments scattered as far as I could see, it would be impossible for me to accept that as truth. About 66 years before the Battle of Gettysburg, Isabella Baumfree was born into slavery in Ulster County, New York – property of the Hardenberghs, a Dutch family. Sun on Oak Hill boiled all but my chilled bones. Voices around seemed muffled, the gravity of history weighing down the sound. If only the specters of the soldiers would appear, or the echoes of their voices. Perhaps their cries wouldn’t be hushed. Dutch-speaking Isabella Baumfree was sold to English-speaking John Neely about 55 years before the Battle of Gettysburg – the language difference cost her many a beating. Eternal Light Peace Monument loomed over my shoulder - flame wavering with each breeze, occasionally appearing to wink out. Flame was nearly constant for 68 years, extinguished only for a time when its fuel was scarce some 30 years ago and when Edison’s invention took the place of fire for nearly a decade. About 53 years before the Battle of Gettysburg, Isabella Baumfree was sold to John Dumont for seventy pounds. Gettysburg is abstract to a second generation American – no family blood on this land at that time. My kin first set foot on New York soil thirty years after blood flowed on soil here. No early memory of crossing the Commonwealth to pay homage here wanders in my brain. An adult mind comprehends the carnage more than a child’s – the carnage may haunt the adult mind, bidding one to return again and again. Isabella Baumfree fled the Dumont Estate about 37 years before the Battle of Gettysburg, taking refuge with a Quaker couple – adopting their name as her own, becoming Isabella Van Wagenen, a free woman. Seminary Ridge was left to the Confederacy – their stones standing guard. North Carolina sons or daughters remember, leaving little Southern Cross and North Carolina Confederate - names written on the white. Southern Cross still wakens darkness in my soul, remembering the history of iron and whip. Roosevelt’s words of 1938 disperse the shadows - “All of them we honor, not asking under which Flag they fought then – thankful that they stand under one Flag now.” Isabella Van Wagenen migrated to New York City about 34 years before the Battle of Gettysburg. Little Round Top woods are the cooling balm from the sun – tempting to remain in the verdant shadows. Stones stand watch amongst the trees, words waiting to be read. Bairn woods, few if any of these trees saw that battle. New York’s fortress stands above the tree line, perpetually watching Devil’s Den. Tall stone tower built to remind serves its duty and then some – family photos clicked from its pinnacle, and youth races up its narrow stairwell. Changing her name once more, Isabella Van Wagenen left New York City 20 years before the Battle of Gettysburg – calling herself Sojourner Truth. Older war’s equivalent of The Wall for Pennsylvanians starkly stands on Hancock Avenue. A name only mausoleum, its engraved bronze plates are scanned for branches of family trees. White and black smudged lines above and below names not forgotten evidence the visit of a higher family branch. What was wholly abstract just a short time ago finally twinges deep within. Even a soul unconnected to the blood spilt here can wither at least a little in the face of this shadow – understand why this darkness overshadows a country still. Thirteen years before the Battle of Gettysburg, the Narrative of Sojourner Truth first appeared in print – written with the help of Olive Gilbert. A year later Sojourner Truth addressed a woman’s rights convention in Washington, D.C. – “Nobody eber help me into carriages, or ober mud puddles, or gives me any best place and ar’n’t I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have plowed, and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me – and ar’n’t I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man (when I could get it), and bear de lash as well – and ar’n’t I a woman?” Stones are still standing watch as they are left behind. Representing what they didn’t witness, reminding generations only what their inscriptions say, or is it more? Those bloody fields didn’t unlock any shackles, nor did they cleanse the thought that a peculiar institution was acceptable from a single mind. Turning the tide of the conflict that would lead to the end of that lifestyle, it claimed its place. Perhaps that change was too quick, leading a people too forcibly to an inevitable end. Words will be written to settle that question long after a stone stands witness to my existence here. The Atlantic Monthly published the article “The Libyan Sybil” - Harriet Beecher Stowe’s tribute to Sojourner Truth - the year of the Battle of Gettysburg. About a year later, President Lincoln invited Sojourner Truth to the White House. On November 26, 1883, Sojourner Truth died in Battle Creek, Michigan. The Battle of Gettysburg claimed the souls of 6655 soldiers and one civilian in three days of battle. Some 29,895 were wounded, and of these, it is still unknown exactly how many had died or were permanently disabled as a result of their wounds. Elizabeth Ross Disclaimer Note: The views and comments conveyed in this article are exclusively those of the writer and in no way reflect, in whole or in part, the official or unofficial views, attitudes, or beliefs of River Walk Journal, Inc. |