The Works of James M. Whitfield: America and Other Writings by a Nineteenth-Century African American Poet

SELF-RELIANCE57

86 America and Other Poems SELF-RELIANCE⁵⁷ I LOVE the man whose lofty mind On God and its own strength relies; Who seeks the welfare of his kind, And dare be honest though he dies; Who cares not for the world’s applause, But, to his own fixed purpose true, The path which God and nature’s laws Point out, doth earnestly pursue. When adverse clouds around him lower, And stern oppression bars his way, When friends desert in trial’s hour, And hope sheds but a feeble ray; When all the powers of earth and hell Combine to break his spirit down, And strive, with their terrific yell, To crush his soul beneath their frown— When numerous friends, whose cheerful tone In happier hours once cheered him on, With visions that full brightly shone, But now, alas! are dimmed and gone! When love, which in his bosom burned With all the fire of ardent youth, And which he fondly thought returned With equal purity and truth, Mocking his hopes, falls to the ground, Like some false vision of the night, Its vows a hollow, empty sound, Scathing his heart with deadly blight, 57. The poem was first published as “Self Reliance” in the North Star, 14 December 1849, 4. Delany has the poet-revolutionary Placido recite a portion of the poem (as his own) in chapter 69 of Blake. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the phrase “self reliance” was first used in 1833, eight years before the publication of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “Self-Reliance.” America and Other Poems 87 Choking that welling spring of love, Which lifts the soul to God above, In bonds mysterious to unite The finite with the infinite; And draw a blessing from above, Of infinite on finite love. When hopes of better, fear of worse, Alike are fled, and naught remains To stimulate him on his course: No hope of bliss, no fear of pains Fiercer than what already rend, With tortures keen, his inmost heart, Without a hope, without a friend, With nothing to allay the smart From blighted love, affection broken, From blasted hopes and cankering care, When every thought, each word that’s spoken Urges him onward to despair. When through the opening vista round, Shines on him no pellucid ray, Like beam of early morning found, The harbinger of perfect day; But like the midnight’s darkening frown, When stormy tempests roar on high, When pealing thunder shakes the ground, And lurid lightning rends the sky! When clothed in more than midnight gloom, Like some foul specter from the tomb, Despair, with stern and fell control, Sits brooding o’er his inmost soul— ’T is then the faithful mind is proved, That, true alike to man and God, By all the ills of life unmoved, Pursues its straight and narrow road. 88 America and Other Poems For such a man the siren song Of pleasure hath no lasting charm; Nor can the mighty and the strong His spirit tame with powerful arm. His pleasure is to wipe the tear Of sorrow from the mourner’s cheek, The languid, fainting heart to cheer, To succor and protect the weak. When the bright face of fortune smiles Upon his path with cheering ray, And pleasure, with alluring wiles, Flatters, to lead his heart astray, His soul in conscious virtue strong, And armed with innate rectitude, Loving the right, detesting wrong, And seeking the eternal good Of all alike, the high or low, His dearest friend, or direst foe, Seeks out the brave and faithful few, Who, to themselves and Maker true, Dare, in the name and fear of God, To spread the living truth abroad! Armed with the same sustaining power, Against adversity’s dark hour, And from the deep deceitful guile Which lurks in pleasure’s hollow smile, Or from the false and fitful beam That marks ambition’s meteor fire, Or from that dark and lurid gleam Revealing passion’s deadly ire. His steadfast soul fearing no harm, But trusting in the aid of Heaven, And wielding, with unfaltering arm, The utmost power which God has given— America and Other Poems 89 Conscious that the Almighty power Will nerve the faithful soul with might, Whatever storms may round him lower, Strikes boldly for the true and right. ODE FOR THE FOURTH OF JULY ANOTHER year has passed away, And brings again the glorious day When Freedom...