Baptism/Ida Mae

While reading the poem “Baptism” from Locke’s “The New Negro,” I found myself relating it to the story of Ida Mae Brandon Gladney.  Claude McKay’s poem offers many elements that speak to Ida Mae’s story and gives voice to her different actions throughout her life.  In the third and fourth lines of “Baptism,” McKay writes, “I will go naked in –for thus ‘tis sweet-Into the weird depths of the hottest zone.”  Here, I was reminded of Ida Mae and her fearlessness of those around her, whether they were abusive toward her or not.  Ida Mae did not back down and was willing to stand for what she believed in.  An example of this resides in her belief that remains today that her father was buried alive and was in a coma, rather than actually dead.  Ida Mae held firm to this belief even though, looking back, she knew that no adult would listen to her because she was just a little girl (24).

Also, as McKay writes, “I will not quiver in the frailest bone, You will not note a flicker of defeat,” I recalled the instance that Ida Mae was called a nigger and when asked if she heard what she was called, responded by saying “They call you so many names. I never pay it no attention” (33).  This nonchalant response by Ida Mae tells me that she does acknowledge negative comments and negativity aimed toward her, but as McKay says, she does not “note a flicker of defeat.”  This occurrence in Ida Mae’s life also had an effect on Miss McClenna, the woman Ida Mae was with at the time, because she was seen to be stepping outside of her caste boundaries by associating herself with a black person.  As I read McKay’s poem, I interpreted the “furnace” to represent the higher caste of whites because Ida Mae enters “Into the furnace […] alone” in the sense that she goes along with Miss McClenna into the territory of other whites without showing any fear. 

Another reason I referred back to Ida Mae’s story while reading “Baptism” was because of the last two lines when McKay writes, “I will come out […] A stronger soul within a finer frame.” In relation to Ida Mae, I interpreted this to mean although she did go through a time in her life that she resented everyone and everything, she understood that these negative aspects of her life would eventually make her a stronger, wiser person who is more aware of the realities of life.  Isabel Wilkerson tells us that when Ida Mae learned about the Carter family leaving Mississippi, she saw it as a signal “that there was, in fact, a window out of the asylum,” giving her hope that a better life is in fact possible (35).