Phillis Wheately was the first African American person to publish a book in 1773. It wasn’t even published in the States. It was published in England under the title Poems on Various Subjects: Religious and Moral. She was originally born in Senegal, in West Africa, and was forced by British sailors to board a ship, intent on selling slaves to the early American colonies, especially the South. She was seven years old then, and categorized as frail in health. They thought that if she was sent to the southern colonies, she would never be sold. In fact they weren’t sure she would even survive the boat trip, and they wanted to sell her as soon as possible, so they wouldn’t lose any profit if she died while still in their custody. A woman who was married to a wealthy merchant in Boston was looking for a housemaid, and they said they would buy her at a discounted price, because her health was so frail. So she was bought, and given a new name: Phillis Wheately, Wheatley being the family name of the people that bought her.
Due to her frail health she spent much of the time in her room, and when she was introduced to other white children in the household who were around her age, she was drawn to their homework. This natural attraction caught the attention of the Wheatleys, and they encouraged her curiosity: teaching her to read, write in English, as well as Latin and Greek, in addition to Geography, and other subjects. She began her career as poet when the colonies were still quite young, writing poems for people who had died, eulogizing them at their memorial services. She would attend a Congregational church in Boston, that would eventually become Unitarian, and she would go sit up above in the seating reserved for black people while the rest of her household mingled freely with other whites. She got to know ministers in the area, and eventually was able to share her poetry along with their sermons and eulogies for well known people that were printed and handed out in Boston Common and other places. Still no one in the United States would publish a book of her poetry, even though her craft and talent were impossible to deny.
She then had the idea to write to those in England with anti-slavery views, who may be able to help her publish. She sailed to England even though she was asthamatic her whole life and still suffered from frail health, and was met by various Earls and potential benefactors including Benjamin Franklin who happened to be in England at the time. Due to this meeting, her first book was published, her only book during her lifetime. Even with the acclaim that came from this published work, no publisher in the United States would consider her, and no press in England would publish a second book. Even still she was invited to the White House to meet George Washington, received endorsements from Benjamin Rush, signer of the Declaration of Independence, as well as the Governor of Massuchusetts, and a few local ministers. But all of this praise did not lead to another published book or a living wage.
When the Wheatelys died, they left their inheritance to their birth children, which was customary, leaving her nothing except her freedom. As a free black woman in Boston she did not belong to anyone, but she had no economic base or means of supporting herself. She married a free black man, John Peters, who aspired to be an entrepreneur in this new America, so that he could leave wealth to his children, so that they might have a better life than him. Due to racism, he was denied access to banks, and couldn’t get any kind of loan. He worked odd jobs trying to support his family, and often was sent to debtor’s prison when the needs of the family were greater than his wages. Throughout all this time Phillis wrote without any publisher, she wrote in a bombed out mansion they lived in near the heart of Boston, a mansion that was destroyed by the British during the war, and that people thought was beyond repair. Former dignitaries and politicians later came to visit her, and were shocked to see her living conditions – it was cold, inhospitable, dreadful. And she grew sicker.
Still she wrote. She wrote while she was ill in this dilapidated mansion. During this time period all of her children died of various kinds of sickness. Still she wrote. When she could feel her own death drawing near, she wrote to her husband who was in debtors’ prison at the time, that she would die alone in that dilapidated house. And she did. She died and she was buried with her children, none of whom survived. There was no funeral procession, no memorial service on record that we know of.
And yet we’re talking about her this morning in a state that didn’t even exist during her lifetime: Phillis Wheately, one of the great American poets. One of my favorite parts of the New Testament is when Jesus is on trial in front of the Sanhedrin, and the high priest asks him: Are you the Messiah? Are you the son of God? And according to Mark’s gospel, Jesus remains silent. I return to this section often. The response of silence, neither affirming nor denying. A response that is beyond yes or no, good or bad, success or failure. A response that is beyond life or death.
In John’s gospel there is a repeated phrase: I am what I am. I am who you think I am during this period of time, and I am more, and I am less. I am what I am. This is true throughout the generations, through the different stories, lifting up people, tearing them down, forgetting all about them for a time. But through all these phases, fundamentally the same: I am what I am. You are what you are. We are what we are. And who we are is always deeper, vaster than any word we can utter. It’s beyond praise, beyond reproach, beyond anonymity, beyond the grave. One of the followers of Thich Nhat Hanh, the Vietnamese monk, was angry with the New York Times because they said he died. This follower wrote a letter to the editor explaining how Thich Nhat Hanh didn’t believe in death, only continuation. His most famous example is how a cloud never dies. It only transforms. The truth of our existence is not life then death. It is life, death, life. There’s always a continuation.
I’ve always felt there is a great wisdom to holy week. Easter doesn’t make any sense without the days that precede it, and the days that come after it. On Thursday you have one of the simplest, most beautiful teachings to the question of what is the point of being alive, what does it mean to be human? The response is so simple and clear: love one another. And because we are humans, and can confuse ourselves so easily, Jesus demonstrates what that really means: washing the feet of his disciples and drying them, preparing them literally for the journey ahead, for the rest of their lives. This is where the stole comes from, a symbol of the towel Jesus put around his neck as he prepared his apostles for the journey. This is a high moment, a moment of clarity, a great relief. I finally know what to do with my life. But then Good Friday comes, the day when the brutality of the world confronts our idealism. We’re confronted with a world that only follows rules of power, motivated by fear, a world that worships death as necessary for human progress and civilization, including warfare.
A world that rationalizes sacrifice of the innocent and the good for some greater ambition or goal. We know this world, we are familiar with it. We see it in Ukraine, we see it in our cities, we see it within our families. We think to ourselves much like the apostles: How could anyone survive this with any vestige of hope in goodness or love? And then comes Saturday, often referred to as the Death of God – it’s when all hope is lost and we are emptied out. All the idealism is gone, all the clarity we had on Thursday is now muddled and confused, and we are left overwhelmed and exhausted with no faith in anything or anyone who could possibly save us. For maybe the first time in our life, we surrender, we surrender to what haunts us, we surrender to what we don’t understand. And out of that complete surrender and loss of hope, Easter morning, a new day, a new life, continuation.
And Easter opens up a new awareness that was always present but we could never appreciate: that continuation was always there, every day was a new day, even when it was gruesome and horrible, and a simple faith based on experience develops: tomorrow will also be a new day, no matter what happens today. Even if I’m not there tomorrow, it will continue, and out of that awareness comes joy. Joy being alive on this day. We become one with joy. And that joy is not a shallow feeling, it is endlessly deep. It empowers us to take that joy to those who are experiencing clarity and relief, to those who are experiencing injustice and violence, it empowers us to bring that joy to those who have lost hope. We can fully show up at any point in the journey, because thanks to Easter, we come to understand we get a new day, a new beginning, a new life rising to meet us, waiting for us to live it.
