Spacious Solidarity Blog: Day 103

Harriet Tubman mural by Michael Rosato

I’ve been thinking about the word “conductor”, which Spring Washam keeps reminding us of on the course I’m taking with her about Harriet Tubman and the Dharma.

It’s interesting living in the UK, where very few people have heard of Harriet or the underground railroad. If they have, what they know about it is vague. Some think it was literally underground, as in tunnels, literally a railroad or literally both.

Imagining a railroad that ran through underground tunnels from the plantations of the south to the refuge of the north is enticing, but that’s not how it worked.

The underground railroad was a metaphor. A metaphor for a network of people who helped enslaved people, in all sorts of ways, to escape bondage and make their way to freedom.

It was a highly sophisticated operation relying on hundreds of white and Black, free and enslaved, abolitionists who worked in a coordinated way to ensure smooth passage from south to north.

As I write that sentence these lines from Beyoncé’s song Formation come to mind:

Okay, okay, ladies, now let's get in formation, I slay
Okay ladies, now let's get in formation, I slay
Prove to me you got some coordination, I slay
Slay trick, or you get eliminated, I slay

Okay ladies, now let's get in formation, I slay
Okay ladies, now let's get in formation
You know you that bitch when you cause all this conversation
Always stay gracious, best revenge is your paper

As I read over those lines, I feel into the enormity of the time and effort it must have taken for the abolitionists to “get in formation” and “get some coordination.”

I can see Beyoncé slaying it like Harriet slayed it. Meaning, getting it so completely and absolutely right that they’re beyond any and all condemnation.

And Harriet did get it so completely and absolutely right. She made an impression in all the right ways, even the ways she eluded those who sought to catch her and put a stop to her fierce, freedom fightin’ ways.

She was a trickster in her slaying. Apparently often hiding in plain sight while slipping past authorities. She would not be eliminated.

And she caused a lot of conversation in her day up to the present moment. And her best revenge was her “paper” meaning her unbridled success. They say she never lost a passenger.

Those who led enslaved people to freedom on the underground railroad were called conductors. Every time they reached the north they would record the number of people they had freed, and any they had lost along the way.

They journeyed on foot over hundreds of miles, often in the winter months and under the cloak of night. There were often bounties on their heads. Slave catchers patrolled the landscape and if they were caught they were often hung.

Conductors were guides, not only showing others the way but giving them the courage to persevere sometimes against the greatest odds. In this way they were also conductors of energy, the kind of energy needed to find the courage and conviction to escape into the unknown, embark on a terrifying journey full of risk and danger, and arrive in a completely new life of freedom and possibilities.

The word conductor also has the word conduct in it. And that is the thing that was most impressive about Harriet, above all other. Her conduct was driven by a power outside of herself. One she was receptive to and in communication with throughout her life.

She herself was guided and in opening to what guided her she also became a guide.

She conducted herself with the utmost respect, integrity and deep, deep wisdom beyond conventional definitions of intelligence and grounded in a knowing of right and wrong that was also beyond ideology.

And this is what ultimately protected her throughout her life. She was the complete embodiment of non-violence and love. Even while carrying a pistol.

Her knowing was grounded in her own direct experience of being enslaved and this is what guided her. The wish to be free from suffering and for others to be free from suffering.

This is also my wish, and the wish of many others I share spiritual practice and community with. May we embody the same wisdom and compassion as Harriet Tubman.

May we be conductors, guides to freedom, energetically inspiring others, and acting in body, speech and mind with impeccable care and wisdom.