Black History Month

Countee Cullen 1903-1946

Good morning! It is now 9 degrees outside this morning. I do love the Midwest though it has my heart. I only wish the seasons consisted of Spring and Fall. Today kicks off Black History Month, which I have mixed feelings about though last year, I tried to read a poem by a black writer almost every day. Don’t know if I will be able to do it here but I will definitely try!

I hadn’t realized that Countee Cullen, Countee LeRoy Porter had passed at such a young age. I am not going to copy/paste a bio because I am a firm believer of Google It. Ha!

But here is a poem and a photo:

Incident
BY COUNTEE CULLEN
(For Eric Walrond)

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.

Carl Van Vechten, © Van Vechten Trust. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University