"Journey", is the fourteenth poem in Brown Girl Dreaming. I feel that this poem truly represents the Woodson family strength. It describes her fathers point of view of the southern in the early 1960's.
Jack Woodson (her father), came to Ohio with his wife. He did this because he couldn't endure living in a racially separated area any longer. There was violence against minority communities, harsh injustices, and He didn't want his future family to have to suffer like that as well.
Jack doesn't want his family to be bound by the racist system in the south. He feels that it is his duty as a father to protect his family from whatever he can.