2013
Incident
Composed by 
Lori Laitman
Lori Laitman Poem by Countee Cullen (1903-1946). Poems used by permission of the Amistad Research Center, New Orleans, LA. Premiere: December 13, 2013, Kerrytown Concert House, Ann Arbor, MI, with Darryl Taylor, countertenor and Kathryn Goodson, piano.
Text
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.