Read the poem Incident by Countee Cullen (p.142-143).
 - Answer all the questions on page 143, except question number 2 of The Reading/Writing Connection.

Explorations of the text.
1. It is hostile, unfriendly. There is no warmth or a sign of friendship that can be seen between the two boys.
2. It is most probably because the treatment the young boy received from the other boy was given by others throughout his stay in Baltimore " From May until December". It may be possible that the boy had observed this kind of similiar treatment being given to the others by the white people staying in Baltimore as well.

The Reading/Writing Connection
1. I had a similiar experience of prejudice that can be compared to the persona in  the poem. Although it was not directly said to me I still felt it since I am an Indian. I was travelling by bus to visit a friend one day and there was some sort of confusion at the traffic lights. The bus was going to turn at a yellow light when a white Mercedes suddenly drove by and stopped at the junction. The Malay bus driver honked at him and was making rude hand gestures towards the car. From the window I could see that the driver of the Mercedes was a middle-aged man. A lawyer or businessman, judging from the way he dressed. He actually had got down but the bus driver had got back in and was cursing the man, calling him "keling". There were 3 other Indians in the bus including me who heard him say that. It hurt. It hurt a lot and I got annoyed but I couldn't do anything. Although it was not directed to me, I still felt the prejudice from that scenario.

Ideas for Writing
1.  Figurative Language
The rhyme scheme in this poem is ABCB. The figurative language that was used in this poem is foreshadowing.
Example: The title of the poem tells us that something is going to happen during the poem that was not positive.

2. Language is a powerful tool. It can be used for both good and bad reasons. In this case the language used here was very bad as it is a young child, a boy of barely 9 years using such language against another boy just because the color of his skin was different. The word "Nigger" being used by young children shows that racism was rampant during that time and there was no control over it. It can be seen that, that one word "Nigger" can cause a young innocent boy such pain, confusion and hurt.