Analyzing The Poem 'The Slave Mother, A Tale Of Ohio'

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In Francis Ellen Watkins Harper's poem "The Slave Mother, A Tale of Ohio," she uses a shifting tone as well as other specific literary techniques to convey the heartbreaking story of a slave woman being separated from her child. This story specifically draws light to the horrific reality that many slaves faced: families were torn apart. Because this poem tells the story of a mother and her son, it also draws light to the love that mothers have for their children and the despair that they would go through if anything were to ever happen to them. Harper's poem addresses both race and gender, and it effectively conveys the heartbreak of the mother to the audience.
The tone throughout most of the poem is devastating, filled with anguish and desperation …show more content…

This heavy word choice made by Harper continues throughout the following stanzas as well, and this evokes a sympathetic feeling from the audience. At this point, it has not been revealed that the person with the "burden'd heart" is a mother, but it still conveys the anguish that the woman is feeling. The woman is also described as having a "bowed and feeble head," and this conveys the helplessness that the woman is feeling in the scene (stanza 2, line 6). The author continues with this tone when the son is introduced as well. He is described as having a "trembling form" that the mother is trying to hide behind herself (stanza 4, line 16). At this point in the poem, it is made much clearer that the mother and son are slaves because the narrator says that "he is not hers," meaning that even though she gave birth to the boy, he was owned by the slave owners (stanza 5, line 17). Therefore, her own son could never truly belong to her. Slavery has created this situation, and the woman was so desperate to get out that she was willing to run away with her son in order for him to have a better love. When they were caught and the threat that he would be taken from her became real, she became devastated and desperate. However, …show more content…

Because this woman is a slave, she has no right to her own child, therefore she cannot claim him as her own. No matter how much she loves him or how much joy that he brings into her dreary life, he can never be hers, and her heart breaks when he is taken away from her. Mothers have a very special bond with their children; they feel a love that can be described as much stronger than any other kind of love in the world. This love that is felt by the slave mother in this poem literally changes the tone of the poem when the narrator speaks about the mother and her son. Despite the anguish and despair that she feels, the thought of her child can lift her spirits, only for the child to be taken away from her. Because of her race, she cannot claim any right to love her own child. As a woman, her right to be a mother and raise and love her child was taken away from her. The slave mother had no rights to herself or her own children, and her race and gender are the main causes for

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