The Drinking Gourd

 The Drinking Gourd 

So, I am back from a week camping with 130 sixth graders (I survived). Not much rest up there...but lots of stars. Some explanation for this poem/story:


In the old south, the star, Polaris, became a symbol of freedom to slaves as well as a guide star. As soon as they were old enough to understand, slave children were taught to locate Polaris by using the stars of the Big Dipper. (The two stars at the end of the bowl of the Big Dipper point over to Polaris, the North Star, which is the end of the handle of the Little Dipper.)
Instead of a fancy metal dipper, slaves used a hollowed-out gourd to scoop water out of a bucket to get a drink. So they referred to the Big Dipper as the Drinking Gourd.
Slaves passed the travel instructions from plantation to plantation by song. One of those songs…. a song with many various words and verses, was “the drinking gourd song”.

With some big butterflies and with wide open eyes
he ran off the first chance that he saw
for the freedom that lies under cold northern skies…
there was no time for tellin’ his pa.

With his fears held inside and inherited pride,
when his mamma’s goodbyes had been said…
he would walk as he cried, with a field workers stride
and the drinking gourd song in his head.

“Run to freedom, young man, when the sun comes on back;
when the quails return south in the spring.
You be holdin’ on tight to your old gunny sack
and the thought of what freedom will bring.”

Now, it’s been twenty years and his runnin’s long done
yet he hears his Ma’s voice at his leavin’.
“Ride the railroad, my son, flee the whip and the gun,
run away without stoppin’ or grievin’.”

“At the end of the handle, a glorious light;
no book-written map could shine bolder.
“Keep you eyes on the gourd in the far northern night;
let the south wind blow over your shoulder.”



More information on the drinking gourd:

click here 

Edited by: thewebsailor at: 10/6/03 2:19 am