Lisa published her first poetry collection, Grasping at Stars, in 2024. And this work has been named a finalist in the 2025 Golden Crown Literary Society Awards, The Goldies. Lisa is a member of Voices of the Revolution, a women’s poetry collective based in Lansing, Michigan. The collective published Lisa’s Poems from the Resisterhood in April 2025.
Besides being a poet, Lisa is also a musician and a member of Sometimes Y, an all-women’s rock-and-roll band in Lansing.
Now, enjoy “Juba’s Spirit,” the winning submission of MANA’s Black History Month Writers’ Contest.
Juba's Spirit by Lisa Sarno
Before the bombastic beat boomed
from a click in the machine
rattling the windows along the street,
it was Black skin on dirt.
The slap of a palm on a thigh
the stomp of a foot,
the body strained and contorted
Juba! Juba!
Juba across the dirt-floored Juke Joints,
Juba loud from the belly of housing projects,
Juba busting the Chain Gang into song,
Juba sliding over the slick floors in the Clubs,
Juba alive in Step Shows,
1 Hop this time!
2 Hops this time!
Saggy pants and a fire for running away
to what Momma fears most.
Through the years, the body remembers
where ankles twist, the shaking of shackles
Shoulders roll, letting off the weight of 400 years
we learned to move through the thickest of times
Right foot 2 Stomps!
Left foot 2 Stomps!
Cha Cha, y’all!
Pidgins and creoles fly into existence
across the ship’s galley
language created “off the dome” and
shouted to each other over the sounds
of misery
“Brag-a-licious!” Juba Spirit says
“I See You In this Strange Land”
“What up, Doh?”
The spit and the strut and the resistance of
it all
Slide to the left!
Slide to the right!
The fictive nature of our blood clan
as we remember being locked and yoked
40 wide and 2 deep.
Teeth bared, lips stretched, nostrils flared
Same hunger in the shuffle
Same fire in the flex
Just a different name for Freedom
We dance and the walls sweat with rebellion
Juba's Spirit by Lisa Sarno
Before the bombastic beat boomed
from a click in the machine
rattling the windows along the street,
it was Black skin on dirt.
The slap of a palm on a thigh
the stomp of a foot,
the body strained and contorted
Juba! Juba!
Juba across the dirt-floored Juke Joints,
Juba loud from the belly of housing projects,
Juba busting the Chain Gang into song,
Juba sliding over the slick floors in the Clubs,
Juba alive in Step Shows,
1 Hop this time!
2 Hops this time!
Saggy pants and a fire for running away
to what Momma fears most.
Through the years, the body remembers
where ankles twist, the shaking of shackles
Shoulders roll, letting off the weight of 400 years
we learned to move through the thickest of times
Right foot 2 Stomps!
Left foot 2 Stomps!
Cha Cha, y’all!
Pidgins and creoles fly into existence
across the ship’s galley
language created “off the dome” and
shouted to each other over the sounds
of misery
“Brag-a-licious!” Juba Spirit says
“I See You In this Strange Land”
“What up, Doh?”
The spit and the strut and the resistance of
it all
Slide to the left!
Slide to the right!
The fictive nature of our blood clan
as we remember being locked and yoked
40 wide and 2 deep.
Teeth bared, lips stretched, nostrils flared
Same hunger in the shuffle
Same fire in the flex
Just a different name for Freedom
We dance and the walls sweat with rebellion
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