Reflecting still on Swing Low, Sweet Chariot

NOTES: After reading Chapter 14. of the Sorrow Songs from Souls of Black Folk by Du Bois, I feel somewhat relieved. Last week, when trying to understand and interpret Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, I found it difficult to really connect.

Excerpt from Du Bois: "Your country? How came it yours? Before the Pilgrims landed we were here. Here we have brought our three gifts and mingled them with yours: a gift of story and song -- soft, stirring melody in an ill-harmonized and unmelodious land; the gift of sweat and brawn to beat back the wilderness, conquer the soil, and lay the foundations of this vast economic empire two hundred years earlier than your weak hands could have done it; the third, a gift of the Spirit."

I believe that in this case, the song comes from a place I cannot truly imagine. The truths sung in Swing Low, Sweet Chariot are not my own and will never be. In this way, they are sacred. I feel more comfortable admitting this: lack of understanding, lack of connection, a real distance from the song and the place it comes from. Although the song, its tones and words, are obviously profound, obviously convey a soul and spirit, there are secrets in there that do not belong to me.

These songs are precious and perhaps deceptively straight-forward. If anything, I do believe they are a gift sometimes, to be appreciated with humility.