Sorry, Julie, I tried and tried to hold off until someone else posted after me.
***
To everyone & anyone who stumbles by,
please click
this link and read every line of the poem it links to.
For those who don't or won't click the link, one stanza:
A charnel stench, effluvium of living death
spreads outward from the hold,
where the living and the dead, the horribly dying,
lie interlocked, lie foul with blood and excrement.
- describing immediate environment where slaves were held (trapped, imprisoned) during long sea voyage.
***
Also, please watch the film inspired by the events described in this masterful poem.
God's alive inside a movie/watch the Silver Screen. - Keith Reid, lyricist for Procol Harum, from the song "Whaling Stories - ".
Egads: edited in. I linked to the WRONG soundfile for Smith & Jones. The Soundcloud version is the one without vocals. The vid I uploaded to Youtube contains the track where I included the vocal part (whispered so as not to wake up my son, who was sleeping in the next room):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zw6Jg7c8q3I
I'll be here all week. There's T-shirts available, and please buy my CD! Enlarge your penis! The chix will love you!