Prelude—The Slaver
He closed the Bible carefully, putting it down
As if his fingers loved it.
Then he turned.
“Mr. Mate.”
“Yes, sir.”
The captain's eyes held a shadow.
“I think, while this weather lasts,” he said, after a pause,
“We'd better get them on deck as much as we can.
They keep better that way. Besides,” he added, unsmiling,
“She's begun to stink already. You've noticed it?”
The mate nodded, a boyish nod of half-apology,
“And only a week out, too, sir.”
“Yes,” said the skipper.
His eyes looked into themselves. “Well. The trade,” he said,
“The trade's no damn perfume-shop.” He drummed with his fingers.
“Seem to be quiet tonight,” he murmured, at last.
“Oh yes sir, quiet enough.” The mate flushed. “Not
What you'd call quiet at home but—quiet enough.”
“Um,” said the skipper. “What about the big fellow?”
“Tarbarrel, sir? The man who says he's a king?
He was praying to something—it made the others restless.
Mr. Olsen stopped it.”
“I don't like that,” said the skipper.
“It was only an idol, sir.”
“Oh.”
“A stone or something.”
“Oh.”
“But he's a bad one, sir—a regular sullen one—
He—eyes in the dark—like a cat's—enough to give you—”
The mate was young. He shivered. “The creeps,” he said.
“We've had that kind,” said the skipper. His mouth was hard
Then it relaxed. “Damn cheating Arabe!” he said,
“I told them I'd take no more of their pennyweight kings,
Worth pounds to look at, and then when you get them aboard
Go crazy so they have to be knocked on the head
Or else just eat up their hearts and die in a week
Taking up room for nothing.”
The mate hardly heard him, thinking of something else.
“I'm afraid we'll lose some more of the women,” he said.
“Well, they're a scratch lot,” said the skipper, “Any sickness?”
“Just the usual, sir.”
“But nothing like plague or—”
“No sir.”
“The Lord is merciful,” said the skipper.
His voice was wholly sincere—an old ship's bell
Hung in the steeple of a meeting-house
With all New England and the sea's noise in it.
“Well, you'd better take another look-see, Mr. Mate.”
The mate felt his lips go dry. “Aye aye, sir,” he said,
Wetting his lips with his tongue. As he left the cabin
He heard the Bible being opened again.
Lantern in hand, he went down to the hold.
Each time he went he had a trick of trying
To shut the pores of his body against the stench
By force of will, by thinking of salt and flowers,
But it was always useless.
He kept thinking:
When I get home, when I get a bath and clean food,
When I've gone swimming out beyond the Point
In that cold green, so cold it must be pure
Beyond the purity of a dissolved star,
When I get my shore-clothes on, and one of those shirts
Out of the linen-closet that smells of lavender,
Will my skin smell black even then, will my skin smell black?
The lantern shook in his hand.
This was black, here,
This was black to see and feel and smell and taste,
The blackness of black, with one weak lamp to light it
As ineffectually as a firefly in Hell,
And, being so, should be silent.
But the hold
Was never silent.
There was always that breathing.
Always that thick breathing, always those shivering cries.
A few of the slaves
Knew English—at least the English for water and Jesus.
“I'm dying.” “Sick.” “My name Caesar.”
Those who knew
These things, said these things now when they saw the lantern
Mechanically, as tamed beasts answer the whipcrack.
Their voices beat at the light like heavy moths.
But most made merely liquid or guttural sounds
Meaningless to the mate, but horribly like
The sounds of palateless men or animals trying
To talk through a human throat.
The mate was used
To the confusion of limbs and bodies by now.
At first it had made him think of the perturbed
Blind coil of blacksnakes thawing on a rock
In the bleak sun of Spring, or Judgment Day
Just after the first sounding of the trump
When all earth seethes and crumbles with the slow
Vast, mouldy resurrection of the dead.
But he had passed such fancies.
He must see
As much as he could. He couldn't see very much.
They were too tightly packed but—no plague yet,
And all the chains were fast. Then he saw something.
The woman was asleep but her baby was dead.
He wondered whether to take it from her now.
No, it would only rouse the others. Tomorrow.
He turned away with a shiver.
His glance fell
On the man who said he had been a king, the man
Called Tarbarrel, the image of black stone
Whose eyes were savage gods.
The huge suave muscles
Rippled like stretching cats as he changed posture,
Magnificence in chains that yet was ease.
The smolder in those eyes. The steady hate.
The mate made himself stare till the eyes dropped.
Then he turned back to the companionway.
His forehead was hot and sweaty. He wiped it off,
But then the rough cloth of his sleeve smelt black.
The captain shut the Bible as he came in.
“Well, Mister Mate?”
“All quiet, sir.”
The captain
Looked at him sharply. “Sit down,” he said in a bark.
The mate's knees gave as he sat. “It's—hot down there,”
He said, a little weakly, wanting to wipe
His face again, but knowing he'd smell that blackness
Again, if he did.
“Takes you that way, sometimes,”
Said the captain, not unkindly, “I remember
Back in the twenties.”
Something hot and strong
Bit the mate's throat. He coughed.
“There,” said the captain.
Putting the cup down. “You'll feel better now.
You're young for this trade, Mister, and that's a fact.”
The mate coughed and didn't answer, much too glad
To see the captain change back to himself
From something made of steam, to want to talk.
But, after a while, he heard the captain talking,
Half to himself.
“It's a fact, that,” he was saying,
“They've even made a song of me—ever heard it?”
The mate shook his head, quickly, “Oh yes you have.
You know how it goes.” He cleared his throat and hummed:
“Captain Ball was a Yankee slaver,
Blow, blow, blow the man down!
He traded in niggers and loved his Saviour,
Give me some time to blow the man down.”
The droning chanty filled the narrow cabin
An instant with grey Massachusetts sea,
Wave of the North, wave of the melted ice,
The hard salt-sparkles on the harder rock.
The stony islands.
Then it died away.
“Well,” said the captain, “if that's how it strikes them—
They mean it bad but I don't take it bad.
I get my sailing-orders from the Lord.”
He touched the Bible. “And it's down there, Mister,
Down there in black and white—the sons of Ham—
Bondservants—sweat of their brows.” His voice trailed off
Into texts. “I tell you, Mister,” he said fiercely,
“The pay's good pay, but it's the Lord's work, too.
We're spreading the Lord's seed—spreading his seed—”
His hand made the outflung motion of a sower
And the mate, staring, seemed to hear the slight
Patter of fallen seeds on fertile ground,
Black, shining seeds, robbed from a black king's storehouse,
Falling and falling on American earth
With light, inexorable patter and fall,
To strike, lie silent, quicken.
Till the Spring
Came with its weeping rains, and the ground bore
A blade, a shadow-sapling, a tree of shadow,
A black-leaved tree whose trunk and roots were shadow,
A tree shaped like a yoke, growing and growing
Until it blotted all the seamen's stars.
Horses of anger trampling, horses of anger,
Trampling behind the sky in ominous cadence,
Beat of the heavy hooves like metal on metal,
Trampling something down. . . .
Was it they, was it they?
Or was it cold wind in the leaves of the shadow-tree
That made such grievous music?
Oh Lordy Je-sus
Won't you come and find me?
They put me in jail, Lord,
Way down in the jail.
Won't you send me a pro-phet
Just one of your prophets
Like Moses and Aaron
To get me some bail?
I'm feeling poorly
Yes, mighty poorly,
I ain't got no strength, Lord,
I'm all trampled down.
So send me an angel
Just any old angel
To give me a robe, Lord,
And give me a crown.
Oh Lordy Je-sus
It's a long time comin'
It's a long time co-o-min'
That Jubilee time.
We'll wait and we'll pray, Lord,
We'll wait and we'll pray, Lord,
But it's a long time, Lord,
Yes, it's a long time.
The dark sobbing ebbed away.
The captain was still talking. “Yes,” he said,
“And yet we treat 'em well enough. There's no one
From Salem to the Guinea Coast can say
They lose as few as I do.” He stopped.
“Well, Mister?”
The mate arose. “Good night sir and—”
“Good night.”
The mate went up on deck. The breeze was fresh.
There were the stars, steady. He shook himself
Like a dog coming out of water and felt better.
Six weeks, with luck, and they'd be back in port
And he could draw his pay and see his girl.
Meanwhile, it wasn't his watch, so he could sleep.
The captain still below, reading that Bible. . . .
Forget it—and the noises, still half-heard—
He'd have to go below to sleep, this time,
But after, if the weather held like this,
He'd have them sling a hammock up on deck.
You couldn't smell the black so much on deck
And so you didn't dream it when you slept.
As if his fingers loved it.
Then he turned.
“Mr. Mate.”
“Yes, sir.”
The captain's eyes held a shadow.
“I think, while this weather lasts,” he said, after a pause,
“We'd better get them on deck as much as we can.
They keep better that way. Besides,” he added, unsmiling,
“She's begun to stink already. You've noticed it?”
The mate nodded, a boyish nod of half-apology,
“And only a week out, too, sir.”
“Yes,” said the skipper.
His eyes looked into themselves. “Well. The trade,” he said,
“The trade's no damn perfume-shop.” He drummed with his fingers.
“Seem to be quiet tonight,” he murmured, at last.
“Oh yes sir, quiet enough.” The mate flushed. “Not
What you'd call quiet at home but—quiet enough.”
“Um,” said the skipper. “What about the big fellow?”
“Tarbarrel, sir? The man who says he's a king?
He was praying to something—it made the others restless.
Mr. Olsen stopped it.”
“I don't like that,” said the skipper.
“It was only an idol, sir.”
“Oh.”
“A stone or something.”
“Oh.”
“But he's a bad one, sir—a regular sullen one—
He—eyes in the dark—like a cat's—enough to give you—”
The mate was young. He shivered. “The creeps,” he said.
“We've had that kind,” said the skipper. His mouth was hard
Then it relaxed. “Damn cheating Arabe!” he said,
“I told them I'd take no more of their pennyweight kings,
Worth pounds to look at, and then when you get them aboard
Go crazy so they have to be knocked on the head
Or else just eat up their hearts and die in a week
Taking up room for nothing.”
The mate hardly heard him, thinking of something else.
“I'm afraid we'll lose some more of the women,” he said.
“Well, they're a scratch lot,” said the skipper, “Any sickness?”
“Just the usual, sir.”
“But nothing like plague or—”
“No sir.”
“The Lord is merciful,” said the skipper.
His voice was wholly sincere—an old ship's bell
Hung in the steeple of a meeting-house
With all New England and the sea's noise in it.
“Well, you'd better take another look-see, Mr. Mate.”
The mate felt his lips go dry. “Aye aye, sir,” he said,
Wetting his lips with his tongue. As he left the cabin
He heard the Bible being opened again.
Lantern in hand, he went down to the hold.
Each time he went he had a trick of trying
To shut the pores of his body against the stench
By force of will, by thinking of salt and flowers,
But it was always useless.
He kept thinking:
When I get home, when I get a bath and clean food,
When I've gone swimming out beyond the Point
In that cold green, so cold it must be pure
Beyond the purity of a dissolved star,
When I get my shore-clothes on, and one of those shirts
Out of the linen-closet that smells of lavender,
Will my skin smell black even then, will my skin smell black?
The lantern shook in his hand.
This was black, here,
This was black to see and feel and smell and taste,
The blackness of black, with one weak lamp to light it
As ineffectually as a firefly in Hell,
And, being so, should be silent.
But the hold
Was never silent.
There was always that breathing.
Always that thick breathing, always those shivering cries.
A few of the slaves
Knew English—at least the English for water and Jesus.
“I'm dying.” “Sick.” “My name Caesar.”
Those who knew
These things, said these things now when they saw the lantern
Mechanically, as tamed beasts answer the whipcrack.
Their voices beat at the light like heavy moths.
But most made merely liquid or guttural sounds
Meaningless to the mate, but horribly like
The sounds of palateless men or animals trying
To talk through a human throat.
The mate was used
To the confusion of limbs and bodies by now.
At first it had made him think of the perturbed
Blind coil of blacksnakes thawing on a rock
In the bleak sun of Spring, or Judgment Day
Just after the first sounding of the trump
When all earth seethes and crumbles with the slow
Vast, mouldy resurrection of the dead.
But he had passed such fancies.
He must see
As much as he could. He couldn't see very much.
They were too tightly packed but—no plague yet,
And all the chains were fast. Then he saw something.
The woman was asleep but her baby was dead.
He wondered whether to take it from her now.
No, it would only rouse the others. Tomorrow.
He turned away with a shiver.
His glance fell
On the man who said he had been a king, the man
Called Tarbarrel, the image of black stone
Whose eyes were savage gods.
The huge suave muscles
Rippled like stretching cats as he changed posture,
Magnificence in chains that yet was ease.
The smolder in those eyes. The steady hate.
The mate made himself stare till the eyes dropped.
Then he turned back to the companionway.
His forehead was hot and sweaty. He wiped it off,
But then the rough cloth of his sleeve smelt black.
The captain shut the Bible as he came in.
“Well, Mister Mate?”
“All quiet, sir.”
The captain
Looked at him sharply. “Sit down,” he said in a bark.
The mate's knees gave as he sat. “It's—hot down there,”
He said, a little weakly, wanting to wipe
His face again, but knowing he'd smell that blackness
Again, if he did.
“Takes you that way, sometimes,”
Said the captain, not unkindly, “I remember
Back in the twenties.”
Something hot and strong
Bit the mate's throat. He coughed.
“There,” said the captain.
Putting the cup down. “You'll feel better now.
You're young for this trade, Mister, and that's a fact.”
The mate coughed and didn't answer, much too glad
To see the captain change back to himself
From something made of steam, to want to talk.
But, after a while, he heard the captain talking,
Half to himself.
“It's a fact, that,” he was saying,
“They've even made a song of me—ever heard it?”
The mate shook his head, quickly, “Oh yes you have.
You know how it goes.” He cleared his throat and hummed:
“Captain Ball was a Yankee slaver,
Blow, blow, blow the man down!
He traded in niggers and loved his Saviour,
Give me some time to blow the man down.”
The droning chanty filled the narrow cabin
An instant with grey Massachusetts sea,
Wave of the North, wave of the melted ice,
The hard salt-sparkles on the harder rock.
The stony islands.
Then it died away.
“Well,” said the captain, “if that's how it strikes them—
They mean it bad but I don't take it bad.
I get my sailing-orders from the Lord.”
He touched the Bible. “And it's down there, Mister,
Down there in black and white—the sons of Ham—
Bondservants—sweat of their brows.” His voice trailed off
Into texts. “I tell you, Mister,” he said fiercely,
“The pay's good pay, but it's the Lord's work, too.
We're spreading the Lord's seed—spreading his seed—”
His hand made the outflung motion of a sower
And the mate, staring, seemed to hear the slight
Patter of fallen seeds on fertile ground,
Black, shining seeds, robbed from a black king's storehouse,
Falling and falling on American earth
With light, inexorable patter and fall,
To strike, lie silent, quicken.
Till the Spring
Came with its weeping rains, and the ground bore
A blade, a shadow-sapling, a tree of shadow,
A black-leaved tree whose trunk and roots were shadow,
A tree shaped like a yoke, growing and growing
Until it blotted all the seamen's stars.
Horses of anger trampling, horses of anger,
Trampling behind the sky in ominous cadence,
Beat of the heavy hooves like metal on metal,
Trampling something down. . . .
Was it they, was it they?
Or was it cold wind in the leaves of the shadow-tree
That made such grievous music?
Oh Lordy Je-sus
Won't you come and find me?
They put me in jail, Lord,
Way down in the jail.
Won't you send me a pro-phet
Just one of your prophets
Like Moses and Aaron
To get me some bail?
I'm feeling poorly
Yes, mighty poorly,
I ain't got no strength, Lord,
I'm all trampled down.
So send me an angel
Just any old angel
To give me a robe, Lord,
And give me a crown.
Oh Lordy Je-sus
It's a long time comin'
It's a long time co-o-min'
That Jubilee time.
We'll wait and we'll pray, Lord,
We'll wait and we'll pray, Lord,
But it's a long time, Lord,
Yes, it's a long time.
The dark sobbing ebbed away.
The captain was still talking. “Yes,” he said,
“And yet we treat 'em well enough. There's no one
From Salem to the Guinea Coast can say
They lose as few as I do.” He stopped.
“Well, Mister?”
The mate arose. “Good night sir and—”
“Good night.”
The mate went up on deck. The breeze was fresh.
There were the stars, steady. He shook himself
Like a dog coming out of water and felt better.
Six weeks, with luck, and they'd be back in port
And he could draw his pay and see his girl.
Meanwhile, it wasn't his watch, so he could sleep.
The captain still below, reading that Bible. . . .
Forget it—and the noises, still half-heard—
He'd have to go below to sleep, this time,
But after, if the weather held like this,
He'd have them sling a hammock up on deck.
You couldn't smell the black so much on deck
And so you didn't dream it when you slept.
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