The Black Boy inn

Sitting on a woven throne, A lantern on the ground

His head in hands, he’s deep in thought, both his feet are bound.

In shackles he was shipped to serve, in this godforsaken land

He shivers through his linen shirt as he sits upon the sand.

He smells the salt upon the air, as he waits to see the boat,

His dreams, and pride of Africa, now all seem so remote.

In days gone by he’d play amongst the lions and gazelle

In nothing but a cloth of skin, before he came to hell.

He’s whipped a thousand times a day, can never do no right

At nine he’d be a warrior now, but he’s ready to give up the fight.

He holds the lantern for the ships to see him on the beach

In daylight hours he runs errands, and is never far from reach.

This boy who thinks upon the sand, did not become a man,

Although his dreams of being free, this young boy never ran.

For reasons, no one understands, or wonders any more

he was buried for 300 hundred years and found beneath a floor.

I wrote this poem whilst pondering the History of a local pub, take a look, http://www.black-boy-inn.com/history.htm . I wondered what life must have been like for this little boy. Ripped from the heart of his home to somewhere alien and unknown, perhaps not understanding what was going on. He had no English, and probably no Welsh, hardly any African community to mix with at the time of his death. He was approximately 10-13 when he died, and his body was exhumed and given a sanctified burial in a local graveyard. The saddest thing was no one knew his name, and there is no documentation for him.

 A little Local history for you.

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