skopia
Born into slavery, Douglass taught himself to read in secret, fought the slave-breaker he was hired out to, and escaped. Naming his owners in print at twenty-seven forced him out of the country.
A trapper and his son drift downriver at first light with a chained animal at the prow, the water so still it doubles them.
Courbet at twenty-six, lunging at the viewer with both hands in his hair and his eyes wide. Half self-portrait, half performance.
Twenty years on the musketeers are older and on opposite sides: d'Artagnan and Porthos serve Cardinal Mazarin, Athos and Aramis the rebels, and the quarrel carries all four to Charles I's scaffold.
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door! Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
Every tone was a testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance from chains.