The Sundays of Satin-Legs Smith: Brooks’ Language

The Sundays of Satin-Legs Smith by Gwendolyn Brooks is considered a highly influential poem during the twentieth century in American poetry. In the beginning, the poem is thought to be simply about a man strolling on a Sunday.  Brooks was trying to incorporate the knowledge of how someone should be spending a Sunday; at least that was what I originally thought when starting reading through this poem. The poem was written to be much more complex than it seems. This poem is obviously about a man and how he treats women throughout his life.  The man in this poem could even be considered to be emasculate because he cares about his appearance and scent more than a woman would.  This concept was unheard of back when this poem was written. Later on, into the poem, I realize that the poem is about, specifically, an African-American man.  Brooks uses several methods within this poem to identify the ways society tries to emasculate the man. In reality, African Americans were still receiving mistreatment during the time this poem was published. 

I believe this poem by Brooks could have been written to anyone really. The piece of writing could most likely be a cry for a wake-up call in regard to how everyone should be treated with respect.  Respect should not be given due to the color of someone’s skin, but rather how much respect is actually deserved.  This is, again, not due to someone’s race whatsoever.  Brooks’ attitude in this poem is descriptive and wise. The way she wrote it makes it easy to understand and an overall hit.  My conclusion regarding the poem is that it is in fact about an emasculate African-American reflected upon by various different voices. This is of course due to the language described and used in the poem’s entirety.