She Said it in a Song
“Jurden Water, black an’ col
Chills de body, not de soul
An’ Ah wantah cross Jurden in a calm time” (718).
The lines of this hymn tell us of Delia’s troubles, Syke being her black and cold tormentor making her time with him the trying Jurden waters that she will need to cross in order to get to her time of paradise. During this time she faces extensive physical labor and mental anguish from Syke which take their toll on her physically. Throughout all this he is not able to touch her soul and she maintains a strong, spiritual faith, wanting to get through this time calmly.
Syke uses Delia’s fear of snakes and her generalization of them to scare her. After an incident of putting a bullwhip over her shoulders, she asks him why he would do such a thing since he knows it scares her and she is told that “If she’s such a big fool dat she’s got to have a fit over an earthworm or string , he don’t keer how bad he skeer(s) her” (713). Tormenting her further, he brings home a snake that burdens and stresses her every time she is around it or thinks of it. Delia receives little comfort from Syke and even less support in getting rid of the snake;
“A whole lot Ah keer ’bout how you feels inside uh out. Dat snake aint goin’ no damn wheah til Ah gits ready fuh ‘im tuh go. So fur as beatin’ is concerned, yuh aint don’t took near all dat you gointer take ef yuh stay ’round me” (718).
He shames and humiliates Delia by publicly having an affair with another woman named Bertha; “Delia’s work-worn knees crawled over the earth in Gethsemane and on the rocks of Calvary many, many times during these months” (717). He puts on great affectionate airs with her in public and pays for her wants and keep; particularly when Delia is there to witness it. The affair is paid for through Delia’s hard work and sweat from her diligent washing of white people’s clothing for money meant to support her and Syke. “Hot or col’, rain or shine, jes ez reg’lar ez de weeks roll roun’ Delia carries ’em an’ fetches ’em on Sat’day” (715). Hurston’s characters on the porch help us further our knowledge of their relationship with them believing that “Syke Jones aint wuth de shot an’ powder hit would tek tuh kill ’em” (715), and what they think of how he treats her;
“Too much knockin will ruin any ‘oman. He done beat huh nough tuh kill three women. Let ‘lone change they looks” (715).
Despite all of Syke’s torments Delia still manages to find strength; her “case differed from the others only in that she was bolder than the others” (714). She thinks about the love she brought to the marriage and the longing for the flesh that Syke had brought. Even though now that longing is for someone else’s flesh she does not let herself get depressed but instead is “able to build a spiritual earthworks against her husband” (714) . Bitterness for the other woman too, she lets go of, knowing that “even if not Bertha it would be someone else” (714). Syke’s complains about her work, “Ah done tole you time and time again to keep them white folks’ clothes outa dis house” (713), threatens it, “Next time, Ah’m gointer to kick ’em outdoors” (713), and attacks her faith, telling her that her work is blasphemous and a sin. Delia still remains strong,
“Mah tub of suds is filled yo’ belly with vittles more times than yo’ hands is filled it. Mah sweat is done paid for this house and Ah reckon Ah kin keep on sweatin in it” (718),
knowing that it is her work and sweat that has paid for their home and food. Syke’s strikes at her faith because he knows her to be religious but Delia does not allow Syke to get in the way of her faith; “Ah got mah letter fum de church an’ moved mah membership tuh Woodbridge–so Ah don’t haftuh take no sacrament wid yuh” (718).
In an attempt to scare her out of their home, Syke lets the snake out of its box and puts it into her wash basket. That night she comes home from a church service to darkness and an absence of matches and in starting her work, opens the basket to find the snake. Alarmed, she runs from the house and hides in the hay loft of the barn where she has “a period of introspection, a space of retrospection, then a mixture of both. Out of this an awful calm” (719). After calming Delia hears Syke enter the house and then get attacked by the snake he had meant for Delia and in his anguish he calls to her. She is able to remain calm and indifferent to him as he calls to her and finally enters into the house to see “his horribly swollen neck and his one open eye shining with hope” (720). She heads out and away from the house; by the time she reaches the Chinaberry tree she has realized that she can not help him, nor does she particularly want to. She waits at the tree and “inside she knew the cold (Jurden) river was creeping up and up to extinguish that eye which must know by now that she knew” (729) and as her tormenting river was fading, the sun was rising on her promise land, Delia near the Chinaberry tree with its deep roots and long life span.
Zora Neale Hurston uses a lot of religious imagery in her short story Sweat, but more important of them is the hymn she has Delia singing on the way home before her final showdown with her tormentors the snake and Syke;
