The Sable Muse
dedicated to Phillis Wheatley

First African American to become a published author and poet Upon a picture of a slave girl in a bonnet, I knew nothing of it My quest it was to find, who is this Phyllis Wheatley? You withheld your abilities to write and read discreetly those who owned you found your writings in chalk wealthy owners who purchased you on the slave block almost nothing to hide your blooming womanhood

at that time the language you truly misunderstood name they extracted from your slave schooner or boat Africa to America it was four years later that you wrote tutored and taught by your slave master’s daughter your mother, every morning to the sun poured out the water two continents to identify, two religions so polarized from Islam to Christianity you engulfed and idealized journey of one who was captured and then sold as a slave founder of all African American Literature and Europe’s rave European Countess helped published your first book toured the country and the Tower of London a look you took Benjamin Franklin a black poetess you were deemed back home the death of your mistress entitled you freed

Gave your hand in marriage to John Peters one of few free men age of thirty-one, gave birth to the last of your three children ended the abbreviated life of a person of high literature reviews the title was not misused when they called you, The Sable Muse


           Amina Akili