I love the inter-webs. You take some perfectly decent, popular 18th century poetry—Gail Collins reports that a lot of people read it at the time, it was popular—that’s also an important achievement of the Black poetic and American women’s communities, and people tend to be either all supercilious (not Quite as old as Homer, is it, Lord Grantham), or kinda…. Weird. (Get her to apologize for not quoting Marx! She’s not Black!).

Personally, in the old sing-song poetry kinda way, I think it’s fun. She’s like the Shirley Caesar (kinda like CeCe Winans’ momma) of Black poetry. Not that I’m an expert, but, obviously the Black race hasn’t only produced rap rebellions, you know. (Ooo, depends on how you define Black. Checkmate. Could be anybody subjected to the anti-Black racism that comes from having Black parents. Or it could be someone I like. Yeah, it could be that.) And I kinda like the sing-song faith, the love of the crazy old white guy preachers, the Jack and Brian and Richard of the 18th century, you know.

—When you explore Black history and achievements, you might find someone you like.
—Ooo, but Yew liked it. Checkmate.
—Ah….
—(new character) (calling upstairs) Mother, are the servants allowed to like poetry?

…. Sometimes the Black girl just wants everyone to be happy. She just wants to nourish us, and succor us.

…. Usually the roots of Twitter troll rage (the left-wing kind) can be found on Wikipedia, but this is one case where the two paths diverge. Phyllis Wheatley, this modest little girl, inspired people.

…. She was a simple woman, but (like Richard said about the saints) she knew, what she knew. (She wasn’t like Kant; he didn’t know what he knew, lol.)