Home! A word most dear. A word I been afraid to use, except when it pushed itself into me mind. Came to the surface unbidden.

Tired, dusty and thirsty, we came round a bend, and in the last burst of sunshine I saw the signpost I been praying for. A signpost I been waiting me whole life to see. There, spread out before me was plot 39. The land that was mine, the land I owned. No longer squiggly lines on a map, but living, breathing lines, holding in a land filled with trees, rocks, a river and wildflowers I would later discover flourishing after a spring downpour. I pulled on the reins of the horses to stop, jumped down from the cart. I wanted to walk the rest of the way, to cross the boundary on me own two feet. And when I walked cross that boundary line, I dropped to me knees, sent a silent prayer of thanks to all those who had helped me to survive to see that day.

Archie Wilson asked me, ‘So what name will you give to your parcel of land?’

And the words flew out of me mouth before I could stop them. ‘Rock Pleasant.’

‘That’s a fine name,’ him said. ‘Mean something to you, does it?’

‘Too long a story,’ I told him. ‘But yes, it mean a lot.’

‘A good place?’

‘A good and terrible place,’ I said, made Wilson confused.

‘Why would you want to remember a terrible place?’ him asked.

I couldn’t answer him then, but kneeling in the dirt on me own parcel of land, I knew why. Rock Pleasant will honour all the people I was forced to leave behind. All the people who crossed my path and headed in a different direction.

Sammy and Eliza, Melon, Winnie, Josephine, little Rose. What of them? Are they living or dead? Grown stooped, gnarled and knotted like me? I will never know. Can’t travel to that side of the world, backra won’t let me. Is what is written on the piece of paper that have the words Conditional Pardon written on it. But with this paper, it mean no man can put me in chains, tell me to work, to run when they call me, force me to obey. Is a bittersweet freedom, because backra take away the sweetest, kindest freedom of all. A return to loved ones, to the land that gave birth to me, and still running hot through me veins.

My island! Jamaica! How it must be changed.