I am compelled to write you upon the reading of your most recent article in the New York Independent, a vivid retelling the events of the Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio two years past. I have been in the north almost five years, and have learned much in this time of the complex social structure that binds us all. I am so inspired by Miss Sojourner, I felt that I must write to you on your experience of listening to her that day.
You and all present, have recounted that profound moment there at the Ohio convention, using words like 'unforgettable' and 'legendary'. I certainly believe that it was all these things: divine, unforgettable, profound, however, also painfully illusory to those who missed it. I have tried again ad again to imagine the crowds, the stage, the women, and her, perched there with the power of men harnessed under her tongue. Strength like them, boldness like them, and speech like theirs, opening her mouth only to lash with her untwisted words. I can not ask you to convey what to me all that the moment would have in had I been in present, but I will inquire as to what it meant for you.
While you argue for the rights of all people, what is it that you make of those words, in which you have written down the strife of women like me? That is to say, a strife not faced by yourself, nor other women like you. Could you understand the words you recounted? Did you understand the pain of possessing a woman's soul, a woman's body, and yet remaining genderless in the eyes of society? For if you posed the question, "Ar'n't I a woman?", from north to south, by all people, you would be affirmed. When she showed the full length of her arm, what did you see? Was it the same power and defiance, more than the results of forced labor, that I once saw in my own limbs?
I wish to know these things, as it reflects the state of true progress of our understanding of humanity. It is my hope that one day our silent cries will be known, as they pealed from the mouth of Miss Sojourner like a divine thunder.
Sincerely,
Sarah Mayberry
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