An Experiential And Intellectual Discourse On The N-Word

the first time you called me nigger
you said, you can’t play with us.

the second time you called me nigger,
I was too smart. too many books for a black black brain.
the third time, nigger
was painted thickly on your picket fence,
was gray as a house on the wrong side of the tracks,
was laced in a bag of crack and woven, tenderly,
niggerniggernigger
on the pages of the case files,
in the orange of the last suit I ever wore.

times four through ten,
nigger get back
at the ballot box, in the Oval Office,
in the hair gel and starchcollar of our American President.
eleven niggernuggets
shoved down my throat
and the throats of my babies—
even our arteries know this name,
know the Golden Arches and their
niggerbop.

only good nigger is a dead nigger,
you said, when you shot me still at twelve years old.

the thirteenth time, you painted your face in
nigger
and wore it for Halloween.

the fourteenth time you called me nigger,
you said pretty for a black—
then, just black.

by the hundredth time, you didn’t have to say the word at all—
n and i and g and g and e dripping on your tongue, r clinging
like rot to your dog teeth.