I only owned one bat,
my favorite,
Roberto Clemente’s name
burnt into the wood—
length 27 I think, a yellow
plank lathed
off some tree in Kentucky.
I swung that Slugger
often as I could
not knowing Clemente
except what Dad had told me—
he was a man who loved
people, who tried
doing good
so was dead. Later,
when our racist neighbor
wouldn’t let me spin
on her swing set—
You can play, she said, freckled,
aiming a finger at my friend,
but he can’t, calling me out—
I thought of my Clemente bat
that, off-duty, Dad leaned
in the front closet in case
anyone dared break in.
So when
she went & called me an N—
I called her Honky back.
Stung, she yelled
for her daddy, who emerged
no matter what she’d said
& threatened me
from his short porch
till I split—some black kid
who dared talk back
like Clemente’s bat.
Even then
I knew you weren’t
supposed to do that.
Only later did I learn
Clemente
means mercy.