Incident

Incident Poem Text

Incident

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 out
  His tongue, and called me, 'Nigger.'

I saw the whole of Baltimore
  From May until December;
Of all the things that happened there
  That's all that I remember.

- Countee Cullen

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