Juneteenth: Liberation ©Dawn Minott |a Haibun

Liberation—the act of setting someone free from slavery, imprisonment, bondage—supersedes the physical. The liberated must have release—freedom from limits in thoughts or behavior. Liberation encompasses the physical, emotional, psychological self to be truly free.

It’s like the prophet-artist Bob Marley sang in “Redemption Song”—“Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery. None but ourselves can free our minds”.

In liberation exists a tapestry woven with threads of courage and dreams. It is a space where boundaries of all types dissolve, and enables the spirit to soar on wings of freedom.

This is what Texas native Opal Lee dreamed of. At 96 years old [in 2023] she fought her entire adult life for this day to be recognized as a federal holiday. June 19, 1865 commemorates Union soldiers arrival in Galveston, Texas, to enforce the Emancipation Proclamation, signed earlier by President Abraham Lincoln, which freed enslaved people.

Renewal in spring
Like nature liberated
Dreams unbound, take flight


Afterword: dVerse Haibun Monday the prompt is to compose a Haibun on the theme “liberation” in honor of Juneteenth, which is today, June 19th.

A haibun is a Japanese literary form that combines prose and haiku.

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In creative solidarity, Dee

20 thoughts on “Juneteenth: Liberation ©Dawn Minott |a Haibun

  1. Pingback: Juneteenth: Not Black, It’s American – Poems & More

  2. Pingback: Free Not Free ©Dawn Minott – Poems & More

  3. Trying to imagine the Emancipation Proclamation declared and nobody enforcing it for a couple of more years. Oh, the agony. The reception of Juneteenth around here is a faint echo from then. Very powerful haibun, Dawn.

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