Hang a Thousand Trees with Ribbons (12 page)

Because he cut the hair of the maids in all the best houses in Boston, he was filled with stories and gossip.

"There," he said finally. And he held up a silver-handled mirror. "What do you think?"

I squealed in delight. My hair was cut short, cropped around my head in hundreds of tiny curls. "It makes my face look..." I stopped just short of the word.

"Saucy," he said.

I touched the curls. "Oh, it's beautiful."

Nathaniel returned, beaming when he saw me. "Who is this dazzling creature, this daughter of Zeus?" he asked.

I blushed. "Don't mock me."

"Would I do such a thing?" And from his frock coat pocket he withdrew a square of paper, unwrapped it, and handed me the most dainty bit of scrimshaw fashioned into a brooch.

I fingered it lovingly. Tears came to my eyes.

Nathaniel did not see them. He was paying Mr. Lewis for his services.

"Thank you, Nathaniel," I whispered as we walked out of the shoppe. "You're so good to me."

"Until the next time I scold."

But my heart was filled with love for him. True, he scolded, and true, we argued. But always it had been Nathaniel who sensed my hurt and pain and rescued me from it.

"Don't thank me," he said gruffly. "I did it for myself. Now I won't have to see you tugging at your hair anymore. You women are so vain about your hair."

"Not half as vain as you men are," I returned, "with your powdered wigs."

He expected the retort from me. I had to have the mettle to stand up to him, always, or I would not have been worth the bother to him. I knew that.

When we arrived at home, I was so anxious to show my mistress my new hairstyle that I ran right through the center hall to where I heard her voice in the kitchen.

I did not see Mary standing in the front parlor with a paper in her hand.

In the kitchen Mrs. Wheatley was taking inventory of the larder. Aunt Cumsee gave me a piece of pie and some milk.

"Phillis, come here." Nathaniel's voice boomed through the house. I ran to him.

He looked up from a chair in the parlor. Mary stood behind him. "This poem—is it of your making?"

I stared at the paper he held as if it had suddenly taken on a life of its own.
How did it come to be in his hand?
That was the paper I'd hidden under my pillow. Then I saw the smugness in Mary's face.

"You've no right to go poking around my things when I'm not here," I flung at her. At the same time I went to Nathaniel and reached for the paper.

He held it aloft. "Hold your tongue! And answer the question."

There was nothing for it but to say yes. So I did.

Nathaniel began to read it then. When he got to the line "
Wisdom is higher than a fool can reach,"
my face went red. And I wanted to run from the room.

How could I make so bold as to write such words?
They were so high sounding, so false. What did I know of wisdom? Oh, I wished Nathaniel would stop reading. He was saying, aloud, all my innermost thoughts, dragging them from the dark reaches of my soul and pouring them out into the sunlight.

"Stop!" I shouted.

Nathaniel stopped. And then the silence was worse. We just stared at one another, he and I. The clock in the corner ticked loudly. I minded that others had come into the room. Mrs. Wheatley and Aunt Cumsee.

"Please don't read any more," I begged. "Please give the paper to me." I reached out for it.

Nathaniel held it away from my grasp. "You
wrote
these words, Phillis? On your own?" He was truly taken aback.

"I won't do it again," I said.

"Mother, did you
hear
it?"

"I did." My mistress stepped forward. Her eyes were filled with a dull confusion.

What had I done?

I stood helplessly while they all stared at me. I felt time passing, moving across the face of the sun, slowly, inexorably, toward eternity.

They were angry with me. I had written something in secret, something Nathaniel knew naught of. Writing was a freedom, he'd told me. But because I was still a child, I was still under the Wheatleys' jurisdiction. And my words must be approved by them.

"I won't do it again. Give me back my work, please. I won't do it again. I promise."

Again I reached for the paper. This time he handed it to me. I turned and started to walk from the room.

In that instant everyone came to life.

"Don't go," I heard from Mary. "I won't poke about your things again, I promise."

"Phillis, dear"—at the same time, from my mistress—"
dear child.
To my knowledge, no Negro has ever written a poem."

"Lord be praised," from Aunt Cumsee.

But it was Nathaniel who stopped me. I felt his hand on my arm. I could not see for the tears of shame in my eyes. For it came to me, then, what I had really done.

I had broken some long-honored rule. I had stepped over some line. I had disrupted the normal workings of the universe.

"Phillis," Nathaniel said, "you had best do it again if you know what is good for you. And again, and again, and again."

After that my life changed. My writing was no longer mine. It belonged, after that day, to the Wheatley family, even as I did. Mary made me copy my poem over and over again to show her friends. When they came for tea, she made me recite it for them. Mrs. Wheatley announced there would be no more chores for me, not even shelling peas or helping Aunt Cumsee make beaten biscuits.

I did not care overmuch for that decision. I missed my time in the kitchen with Aunt Cumsee. She had a steadfast earthy wisdom that I needed to balance my daily diet of Greek and Latin.

Mrs. Wheatley had a new cherrywood desk brought to my room. Mary gave me a bowl of potpourri to set on it and two silver candleholders with beeswax candles.

I was supplied with expensive vellum, a new ink-pot, two new quill pens, very sharp. The fire in my grate was kept up all night against the chill. In case I was "seized by a thought and wanted to write it down," Mrs. Wheatley said.

Mr. Wheatley contributed a hunt tapestry to be hung on one wall. It was old and valued. I had always seen it in his library. It was from England.

Aunt Cumsee gave me a special shawl to wear around my shoulders to ward off drafts if I "had the notion to write in the middle of the night." She kept me supplied with trays of tea and cooked special things for me. Cream soups. Apples in chocolate sauce. The lightest of pastries.

I was to keep my usual schedule of a morning: breakfast with the family, then read the Bible with Mary and her mother for half an hour and devote an hour to doing my needlework. Then I was to accompany Mrs. Wheatley on calls.

After a noon meal I was to rest for an hour, then study lessons for an hour and spend the rest of the day at my desk, writing.

Lessons were shortened by Nathaniel. I was no longer required to do sums or geography. But I was to read Mather Byles, Thomas Burnet, Jonathan Edwards, and more Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope.

Yes, my life changed. But I preferred it the way it was before I became "Mrs. Wheatley's nigra girl who writes poetry." When my writing was mine alone, to be held close and cherished.

If I did not produce great works in the next year, no one complained. They urged me to take my ease, read, think, and study. But always I sensed them waiting for me to write my next poem.

How often I tried! But nothing happened. The words turned to dust under my pen.

I cried in secret. I brooded. I sulked. One evening when Nathaniel was being especially hard on my Latin translations, I cried.

"I can't think," I said. "I can't do anything."

"The poetry will come, Phillis," he said.

"Then why haven't I written anything?"

"It will come."

I covered my face with my hands. "I'm a fraud," I said. "The first poem was only an aberration. Everyone will say that!"

"If anyone dares, I'll call him out for a duel."

I looked at him. He meant it. He believed in me.

"You've been working too hard," he said, getting up. "You're only thirteen, for heaven's sake. Give yourself time. Now get some rest. The poetry will come when you least expect it."

Nathaniel believed in me. Somehow I found that worse than anything.

It was Pope's Day, November 5. I did not quite understand what it meant. But it originated in England and had something to do with hating Catholics. Enough reason for Boston to celebrate. It was a day of bright blue skies. Since Parliament repealed the Stamp Act in March of '66, a dubious peace had descended upon Boston. Still, all day the students had been taking on in the street below my window, blowing conch shells, drinking in public, shouting saucy things to women, and in general making nuisances of themselves.

I found them an annoyance. I had a headache. Virgil evaded me. I looked at the dry pages and wondered how I could ever do the translations Nathaniel wanted. And why I must do them when all of humanity seemed to be doing as they pleased.

When did I ever do as I pleased? The last time was the morning I'd run off to meet Obour in the rice fields.

I wanted to run free now. Why did I have to be inside studying on such a golden autumn afternoon, when those spoiled boys from Harvard were out there making sport?

Because they were rich, white, and male. And their place in life was certain. While I, who likely had more brains and wits than any two of them combined, had to sit confined and behave because I wrote poetry and I was a nigra girl.

I set my book aside and started to write.

For the next two hours, while the fire spit in the grate and the noise of the revelers continued outside my window, I wrote. From somewhere belowstairs a clock chimed. I heard Mrs. Wheatley's voice, heard a door slam, a dog bark in the distance. I lost all track of time. When I was finished, I stopped and read what I had written.

I liked the last stanza the best.
Improve your privileges while they stay, ye pupils, and each hour redeem, that bears or good or bad report of you to heaven.

Yes, it was good. I sat back, unbelieving. I had done it! I had written another poem! My headache pressed hard against my temples. I was spent.

Footsteps in the hall, a knock, then Nathaniel came in. "I hope you've been studying, Phillis. Is that tea hot?"

I could scarce contain myself. "Yes."

"Pour a cup for me. I couldn't get anyone in the kitchen to even pay mind to me. The place is in turmoil, what with the gathering Mother is having tonight for Reverend Occom and Messrs. Hussey and Coffin."

"And your friends," I reminded him.

He shrugged. "Business acquaintances. They must be feted if I'm to serve as financial exchange agent for them. They are all powerful merchants. Are those pastries fresh?"

"This day Aunt Cumsee made them."

"They spoil you rotten, Phillis." He took a pastry and devoured it hungrily. "Pope's Day. It was hell out in the streets. Captain Macintosh and his boys. I rue the day the North and South End gangs ever buried the hatchet."

"I've written a poem," I said.

He stopped chewing and stared at me. "The devil you have."

"I've been working on it these past two hours."

He set down his cup and held out his hand.

I gave it to him.

He leaned back in his chair and read. Darkness was gathering outside. The fire was getting low in the grate.

He set the paper down. "It's very good."

"Thank you."

Then, of a sudden, he jumped up, grabbed me, and whirled me around the room. "I told you you could do it, didn't I?"

"Yes!" I shouted. "Yes. Oh, stop, you're making me dizzy."

He stopped, but he could not be still. He paced. "Wait until Mother hears this. Let me have it. I must show it to her before the guests arrive. And you will recite it tonight."

"Oh, Nathaniel, no!"

"Yes!" He was jubilant.

My face clouded. "I'm worried about something, Nathaniel."

He was rereading the poem.

"I wrote my first poem because I was angry with Mary. And this one because I was annoyed at the ruckus the Harvard boys were making. What does that mean?"

"That you're a poet," he said.

"Oh, Nathaniel, please listen. Is anger my muse, then?"

He stopped reading. "
Omnia vincit amor, et nos cedamus amori.
What does that mean, Phillis?"

"I don't know."

"It means, 'Love conquereth all things, let us yield to love.' You have anger in you, Phillis. Write it away. It will quit your soul, and other emotions will be your muse. You've done well. It's a good poem. Don't flay yourself."

He left. I sat before the fire.
Let us yield to love,
he had said. Oh, Nathaniel.

I had lost my cowrie shell!

Frantically I scrambled around my room looking for it.
Where had I put it?
I got down on my hands and knees and felt around the rug. I stood up and felt in the pocket I wore around my waist. There was a hole in it! I'd been so busy playing the poet that I'd not sewed it up.
How could I recite in front of all those people?
I must look again for my shell.

"Phillis? You must come down. We're waiting. Supper will soon be served." It was Mary.

"All right, I'll be along directly."

Mary was playing "The Fair Flower of North-umberland" on the harpsichord as I slowly descended the stairs ten minutes later, without the shell. Candles cast brilliant light. Women in French silks moved through the Wheatley dining room and parlor, chattering. Men in powdered wigs and richly embroidered frock coats stood in bunches, sipping wine. Everywhere, silver gleamed, crystal shone, the fragrances of candles and good food mingled.

I stood hesitating in the hallway. The missing cowrie shell cut a sense of loss deep within me. I felt naked, unprotected. And some instinct told me I needed protection. I was nervous.

Sulie and Aunt Cumsee were setting steaming platters and silver urns of food down on the table. Mrs. Wheatley announced dinner. Gentlemen offered their arms to ladies. Chairs were pulled out from the table. People took their places.