Incident

Incident

(For Eric Walrond)

ONCE riding in old Baltimore,Heart-filled, head-filled with glee,I saw a BaltimoreanKeep looking straight at me.Now I was eight and very small,And he was no whit bigger,And so I smiled, but he poked outHis tongue, and called me, “Nigger.”I saw the whole of BaltimoreFrom May until December;Of all the things that happened thereThat’s all that I remember.

ONCE riding in old Baltimore,Heart-filled, head-filled with glee,I saw a BaltimoreanKeep looking straight at me.Now I was eight and very small,And he was no whit bigger,And so I smiled, but he poked outHis tongue, and called me, “Nigger.”I saw the whole of BaltimoreFrom May until December;Of all the things that happened thereThat’s all that I remember.

ONCE riding in old Baltimore,Heart-filled, head-filled with glee,I saw a BaltimoreanKeep looking straight at me.

ONCE riding in old Baltimore,

ONCE riding in old Baltimore,

Heart-filled, head-filled with glee,

I saw a Baltimorean

Keep looking straight at me.

Now I was eight and very small,And he was no whit bigger,And so I smiled, but he poked outHis tongue, and called me, “Nigger.”

Now I was eight and very small,

And he was no whit bigger,

And so I smiled, but he poked out

His tongue, and called me, “Nigger.”

I saw the whole of BaltimoreFrom May until December;Of all the things that happened thereThat’s all that I remember.

I saw the whole of Baltimore

From May until December;

Of all the things that happened there

That’s all that I remember.


Back to IndexNext