Harper, Frances Ellen Watkins (1825-1911) is an African American writer and antislavery, women’s rights, and temperance activist. Harper aimed at the upliftment of African Americans, and in particular African American women in the diverse ways that she could. Her campaigns at promoting the same has rendered her “one of the best-known and most respected black women of the 19th century.” She has restricted her literary capabilities to the causes she stood for: abolition of slavery, racial equality, suffrage and women’s rights.

The poem “I Wear an Easy Garment” is given the alternative title ‘Free Labour.’ This echoes the theme as the free labour comes across to the onlookers as an easy garment the average labourer wears. The garment may be the smile he adorns that is taken for granted by the capitalist class he works for. The speaker thus protests against the practice of slavery practiced amongst free African Americans. The garment does not project the tears of anguish over the years that the toiling slave registers. He does not exhibit the tears during the whole of his lifetime, and even during his passage to the grave. The tears are hopeless, as the slave is. He has no hope to live, for, hope is the primary requisite for those who aspire to live.

I wear an easy garment, O’er it no toiling slave Wept tears of hopeless anguish, In his passage to the grave.
And from its ample folds Shall rise no cry to God, Upon its warp and woof shall be No stain of tears and blood.
Oh, lightly shall it press my form, Unladen with a sigh, I shall not ‘mid its rustling hear, Some sad despairing cry.
This fabric is too light to bear The weight of bondsmen’s tears, I shall not in its texture trace The agony of years.

The garment has plentiful sides to it. Yet no side shall (dare to) express a cry to God. The line comes across, ironically, as a commandment from the Bible:” Shall rise no cry to God”. The other lines of the poem hold a similar tenor. In cloth weaving: the horizontal threads are termed as the ‘woof’ (or sometimes ‘weft’) and the vertical are called the ‘warp.’ The poetess asserts that even in the detailed texture of the dress of the speaker, the observer cannot discern any sign of tear or blood. For the hurt is too deep for physical scars. The phrase “warf and woof” denotes ‘basic elements’. Therefore, the words may also signify that- though the slaves construct the base of society, the base remains without highlighting their tears and blood imprinted on these basic elements.

The poetess speaks in the first person from the point of view of the typical negro slave. He claims how the garment touches delicately on his form as though not to make its presence felt. It is not even laden with a ‘sigh’ expressing the slightest sign of emotion. The speaker says that he does not mind its rustling as it is stifled with despairing cries. The fabric that is weaved is too light to bear the weight of the bondsmen’s tears. There is no sharp voice to penetrate the seems and folds, the voice fails to reach for anything.

Too light to bear a smother’d sigh, From some lorn woman’s heart, Whose only wreath of household love Is rudely torn apart.
Then lightly shall it press my form, Unburden’d by a sigh; And from its seams and folds shall rise, No voice to pierce the sky,
And witness at the throne of God, In language deep and strong, That I have nerv’d Oppression’s hand, For deeds of guilt and wrong.

The man owing to atrocities, has lost the capacity to express any kind of love. Hence his beloved is deprived of his love. The idea may pertain also to the funeral shroud; the woman’s only wreath-memento of love appears to be rudely torn apart. The slave hitherto seemed to possess no identity. But as the cloth presses against the body of his after death, his body appears to assume some shape to assert individuality. Yet the voice that rises does not pierce the sky. Rather it expresses itself in a language ‘deep and strong’ that has nerved the hand of Oppression for the deeds of remorse and wrong. The speaker would prefer to break rather than bend before his oppressor. Hence, he gives in to Free Labour.

© Rukhaya MK 2010
The content is the copyright of Rukhaya MK. Any line reproduced from the article has to be appropriately documented by the reader. ©Rukhaya MK. All rights reserved.

References:
(http://www.africanaonline.com/2010/08/harper-fances-ellen-watkins-free-labor/)