Feet

The feet of the poem symbolize the labor of Black women. Despite the title “Harlem Shadows,” the poem almost entirely centers around the image of feet moving through Harlem. The feet are described in many different iterations; first they are “halting” (1), then “slippered” (5). They are at first “prowling” (6) then, after a long night of work, are “trudging” (12) and “weary” (17). Moreover, although McKay situates the poem in “Negro Harlem,” the feet are not necessarily reducible to one singular racial identity (2). The women are first described as “little dark girls,” (5) before becoming “little gray feet,” (8) and by the poem’s end, “sacred brown feet” (16). What is consistent, however, is that the feet all belong to women. Thus, McKay suggests the importance of Black women’s labor to the social, cultural, and economic scene of Harlem. Furthermore, the choice to focus on the hurried movement and weariness of their...