Gust: Poems

Carlo Finds Out Where His New Friend’s Name Came From

Carlo Finds Out Where His New Friend’s Name Came From Made me a friend at Sunnyside, a twenty-year-old guy named Human. He plant some cayenne pepper seed among the cotton ’cause the straw boss wouldn’t let us grow no garden. On the front porch of Human’s quarters, he keep a splintery church seat we called the pepper pew. That’s where we always roost, gobble a pail of red-hot devil-finger peppers like most folks chomp on grapes. One day I ask, “How come they call you Human?” He say, “One time at the company store, some dude say a white girl been sneaking off in the woods with a black boy. The old Ku Klucker at the till talk with a skinny goat whine, say, ‘If you take a blob of mud and a scoop a iced cream and mash them up together, you’ve totally rurnt the iced cream and hadn’t done a goddamn thing for the mud.’ “’Bout that time, he say, ‘Nigger, you need help with something?’ I stare him down. His scabby face look like a peeling gourd. I say, ‘I ain’t a nigger. I’m a human.’ He spit some chew, say, ‘Alright, Human. 61 62 What you need?’ Everybody laugh and I been Human ever since.” He stopped and waited. I hush hush. “Damn, Carlo! You just gonna sit there? This is me telling you the story, not the shit happening again. At least laugh. That’s one way to own it all.” I laughed a little chuckle and reached in the pail, wishing things was different. Chawing a jaw full of pepper, Human say, “It’s good you practicing up on eating heat. You fixing need it round these parts.” ...