strong beyond all definition still

defying place and time and circumstance

assailed

impervious

indestructible

Look  on me and be renewed

Black women whose ancestors were brought to the united states beginning in 1619 have lived through conditions of cruelties so horrible, so bizarre, the women had to reinvent themselves. They had to find safety and sanctity inside themselves or they would not have been able to tolerate such torture. They had to learn quickly to be self forgiving, for often their exterior actions were at odds with their interior beliefs. Still they had to survive as wholly and healthily as possible in an infectious and sick climate.

Lives lived in such cauldrons are either obliterated or forged into impenetrable alloys. Thus, early on and consciously, black women became realities only to themselves. To others, they were mostly seen and described in the abstract, concrete in their labor, but surreal in their humanness.

They knew the burden of feminine sensibilities suffocated in the burden of masculine responsibilities.

They wrestled with the inescapable horror of undergoing pregnancies that could only result in feeding more chattels into the rapacious maws of slavery.

They knew the grief of enforced separations from mates who were not theirs to claim, for men themselves did not have legal possession of their own bodies.

And men whose sole crime was their hue,

the impress of their Makers hand,

and frail and shrinking children too

were gathered in that mournful band*

The larger society observing the women’s outrageous persistence in holding, staying alive, thought it had no choice but to translate the perversity and contradictions of the black woman’s life into fabulous fiction of multiple personalities. They were seen as acquiescent, submissive Aunt Jemimas with grinning faces, plump laps, fat embracing arms and brown jaws pouched in laughter. They were described as leering buxom wenches with round heels, open thighs and insatiable sexual appetites. They were accused of being marauding matriarchs of stern demeanor, battering hands, unforgiving gazes and castrating behavior.

When we imagine women inhabited by all these apparitions, it becomes obvious that such perceptions were national, racial and historical hallucinations. The contradictions stump even the most fertile imagination, for they could not existed without the romantic racism that introduced them into the American psyche. Surprisingly, above all, many women did survive as themselves. We meet them, undeniably strong, unapologetically direct.

This is not to sing the praises of the black woman’s stamina. Rather, it is a salute to her as an outstanding representative of the human race. Kudos to the educators, athletes, dancers, judges, janitors, politicians, artists, actors, writers, singers, poets and social activists, to all who dare to look at life with humor, determination and respect. They do not abide hypocrisy and those who would practice chicanery find the honesty of these women terrifying.

The heartbreaking tenderness of black women and their majestic strength speak of the heroic survival of a people who were stolen into subjugation, denied chastity and refused innocence.

These women descended from grandmothers and great-grandmothers who knew the lash firsthand, and to whom protection was nothing more than an abstraction. Their faces are here for the ages to regard and wonder, but they are whole women. Their hands have brought new life into the world, nursed the sick and folded the winding sheets. Their wombs have held the promise of a race that has proved in each challenging century that despite threats and mayhem, it has come to stay. Their feet have trod the shifting swampland of insecurity yet they have tried to step neatly onto the footprints of mothers who went before. They are not apparitions; they are not superwomen; despite the enormity of their struggles they are not larger than life. Their humanness is evident in their accessibility.

We are able to enter into the spirit of these women and rejoice in their warmth and courage.

Precious jewels all. Thanks to their persistence, art, sublime laughter and love we may all yet survive our grotesque history.

+Mari Evans, I am a black woman.

*Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, the slave auction

 

 

From

MAYA ANGELOU

EVEN THE STARS LOOK LONESOME

Virago press

1998

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