To S.M., a Young African Painter, on Seeing His Works

“To S.M., a Young African Painter, on Seeing His Works” by Black 18th century poet Phillis Wheatley was published in her first and only collection of poetry, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, in 1773. Although Wheatley was an enslaved person, most of her poetry rarely explicitly tackles questions of Black identity or mentions Wheatley’s personal life. However, this lyric poem focuses on a personal connection with another Black artist.

In the poem, Wheatley’s speaker expresses her emotional reaction upon seeing a painting. The speaker pushes the artist Scipio Moorhead to seek immortality before pivoting to a philosophical discussion about the relationship between art, artist, fame, and death. The poem reflects Wheatley’s interests: It is filled with Greek and Roman allusions and includes a Christian message, concluding that the immortality of heaven outlasts the artist’s earthly creativity and fame.

Poet Biography

Phillis Wheatley, also sometimes spelled Phyllis and Wheatly, was the first African American poet and only the second woman poet to be published. Wheatley, one of the best-known American poets of the time, wrote prolifically. Her poems often center on her religious faith, classical ideals, and the emerging American identity.

Wheatley was born in approximately 1753. When she was about seven years old, slavers kidnapped her from Senegal or Gambia, West Africa. Because of her age and frailty, Wheatley arrived in Boston rather than being sold in the West Indies or Southern Colonies. Prominent Boston merchant and tailor John Wheatley bought Wheatley as a slave for his wife, Susanna. The Wheatleys named the young girl after the slave ship she was brought on, The Phillis, while giving her their surname, as was custom.

John Wheatley, considered a progressive man for the times, allowed Wheatley to learn how to read and write alongside the Wheatley children. The breadth of her education was unusual not only for an enslaved person, but also for a woman of the time: She studied the Bible, astronomy, geography, history, British literature with a focus on John Milton and Alexander Pope, and Greek and Latin works by Virgil, Ovid, Terence, and Homer.

Wheatley started writing and publishing poetry at an early age. At age 13 in 1767, she published “On Messrs. Hussey and Coffin,” which describes the miraculous saga of survival at sea. Her second published poem, “An Elegiac Poem, on the Death of that Celebrated Divine, and Eminent Servant of Jesus Christ, the Reverend and Learned George Whitefield” (1770), brought her to prominence and national renown.

With the exception of "To the King's Most Excellent Majesty" (1768), which praised King George III for repealing the Stamp Act, her poetry mostly echoed the ideals and ideas of the American Revolution. Wheatley wrote letters to ministers and others on the subjects of freedom and liberty. She wrote a well-received poem praising George Washington’s appointment as commander of the Continental Army. However, Wheatley’s opposition to slavery heightened during this time. Wheatley believed that slavery prevented colonists from achieving true heroism.

At age 18, Wheatley advertised for subscribers for her collection of 28 poems. But colonists found it difficult to believe that an enslaved woman was capable of writing such accomplished and exceptional poetry. Wheatley had to defend her authorship in court, proving to notable Bostonians including John Hancock, that she had indeed written her poems. As a result, they signed an attestation to her authorship that was included in the preface of her book. To find a publisher, the Wheatley family sent her work to connections in London, where Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon, a wealthy patron of evangelical and abolitionist causes, arranged for Wheatley’s book to be published.

The first edition of the collection, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, was printed in the summer of 1773. Its 39 poems included not only “To S.M., a Young African Painter, on Seeing His Works,” but other notable poems like “On Being Brought from Africa to America” and “A Hymn to the Evening.” Wheatley’s poetry heavily featured Christian themes and Classical allusions. Over one third of these poems were elegies. The only poem to substantially directly discuss her own life and directly discuss slavery is “On Being Brought from Africa to America.”

In 1773, Wheatley was manumitted. As a result, Wheatley’s situation became tenuous. While slavery is undeniably wrong, the reality for a freed Black woman was complicated. The Wheatley family had provided stability and a position of relative respectability for her, allowing Wheatley to live without being exposed to the difficulty of physically demanding labor or extreme abuse. As a free Black woman, Wheatley had difficulty supporting herself. Wheatley’s artistic and personal life reflected this contradictory and complex reality.

On April 1, 1778, Wheatley married John Peters. A free Black man, Peters attempted a variety of careers: lawyer, grocer, baker, barber, and bartender. However, during the height of the Revolutionary War, Wheatley Peters and her family lived in abject poverty. Between 1779 and 1783, she may have had as many as three children, none of whom lived to adulthood. To support her family, Wheatley Peters worked as a charwoman. Despite these difficulties, Wheatley Peters continued to write and publish poems. In the fall of 1779, she tried to solicit support for a second volume of poetry that would have included 33 poems and 13 letters, but was again unable to find support in America despite her reputation. Many of these poems are now lost.

In 1784, she used the pseudonym Phillis Peters to publish a poem praising America’s victory. On December 5, 1784 at the age of 31, Phillis Wheatley died in childbirth. Her infant son, her last surviving child, soon died and was buried with her.

Poem Text

To show the lab'ring bosom's deep intent,

And thought in living characters to paint,

When first thy pencil did those beauties give,

And breathing figures learnt from thee to live,

How did those prospects give my soul delight,

A new creation rushing on my sight?

Still, wond'rous youth! each noble path pursue;

On deathless glories fix thine ardent view:

Still may the painter's and the poet's fire,

To aid thy pencil and thy verse conspire!

And may the charms of each seraphic theme

Conduct thy footsteps to immortal fame!

High to the blissful wonders of the skies

Elate thy soul, and raise thy wishful eyes.

Thrice happy, when exalted to survey

That splendid city, crown'd with endless day,

Whose twice six gates on radiant hinges ring:

Celestial Salem blooms in endless spring.

Calm and serene thy moments glide along,

And may the muse inspire each future song!

Still, with the sweets of contemplation bless'd,

May peace with balmy wings your soul invest!

But when these shades of time are chas'd away,

And darkness ends in everlasting day,

On what seraphic pinions shall we move,

And view the landscapes in the realms above?

There shall thy tongue in heav'nly murmurs flow,

And there my muse with heav'nly transport glow;

No more to tell of Damon's tender sighs,

Or rising radiance of Aurora's eyes;

For nobler themes demand a nobler strain,

And purer language on th' ethereal plain.

Cease, gentle Muse! the solemn gloom of night

Now seals the fair creation from my sight.

Wheatley, Phillis. “To S.M., a Young African Painter, on Seeing His Works." 1773. poets.org.

Summary

In “To S.M., a Young African Painter, on Seeing His Works,” the speaker describes the reaction and emotions that a painting by Scipio Moorhead, an enslaved artist Wheatley was friends with, has evoked. Overwhelmed with the beauty of the work, the speaker implores the artist to seek “immortal fame” (Line 12). The speaker connects this immortal fame to everlasting life in a Christian heaven. In this way, the speaker and the painter can transcend death. Here, the speaker shifts from a response to the painter’s artwork to a more philosophical discussion of art. The speaker first wishes to invoke the muses of classical tradition. However, when the speaker reflects upon their future deaths and the promise of Heaven, she rejects classical allusions and expectations as useless. In death, neither painter nor speaker will need inspiration­­­ and they will have nothing to write about. In death, she laments, their ability to create will also die.