ABSTRACT
(from a true incident, 1957) I went down to Boston harbor to see what I could see there and down on the sidewalk was a black man dead and blood ran from his throat and blood was in his hair A white woman bending over him her eyes were wet and she bowed her head then she turned her face toward me these were the words she said “He loved me like a proper man I loved him back like a woman should now he lies on the sidewalk dead but his blood is as red as a white man’s blood” These truths we hold self-evident from them no turning back that man is equal born to man unless that man be black I knew as I left the harbor with the blood wet under my feet that only cold black violence could clean that bloody street I came back from Boston harbor was the hottest time of the year a nation lay on the sidewalk there it smelled of blood and it smelled of fear
