Stolen Girls in Georgia, July 1963

Photo Credit: Nick Owuor

Stolen Girls in Georgia, July 1963* by Stacy Vargas

Girls became protestors

Peacefully marched and preached for our rights

Tried to buy movie tickets for integration than segregation

Police arrived and was taken in blinded police vans to a stockade cell

Protestors became prisoners

Miles from our homes and not sure how long we had been inside

May had been a few days but it felt much longer

Bars covered broken windows and gave a cool breeze

Some of us slept on broken beds while others slept on the concrete floor

Ate cold greasy food and drank water from the shower head

Prisoners became sisters

We prayed and sang to be safe, to be free

A guard threw a snake inside

We screamed and ran outside, but did not know where we were

No means of escape and how to get back

No contact from friends and family

Sisters became survivors

A young white man appeared with a camera

We told our stories, as he took our pictures

Our stories were public news which became our rescue

Returned home where our families are waiting for us

I hugged my parents so tight, tears of happiness

Praised God that I am home yet knew that the war was not over

* July 1963 in Americus Georgia, 15 to 30 young girls, ages 12 to 15, were arrested during a peaceful protest at a movie theater.  They were held in a stockade facility in Leesburg, Georgia for at least 45 days.

Stacy Vargas

Stacy Vargas was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. During her undergraduate years at Brooklyn College, she was a member of a literary club called Guava Shakti which she was able to publish her writing at the club’s magazine. Vargas graduated last year at St. Francis College with a Master Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing, focused on Poetry. She had self-published a collection of poetry in 2018 called: Fight, Survive and Thrive. She had published some of her poems in Feminessay, Wingless Dreamer, Spoken Black Girl blog, A Plate of the Pandemic, Alternative Field and PoetraeBooks: Roar Series. She’s currently a fellow with Anaphora Literary Arts.

Instagram: @ycatsav