“I say, ‘Coming from work, sir.’

“They say, ‘Where do you work?’

“Then I have to go into my whole pedigree because I am a black man in a white neighborhood. And if my answers do not satisfy them, BOP! MOP!… BE-BOP!… MOP! If they do not hit me, they have already hurt my soul. A dark man shall see dark days. Bop comes out of them dark days. That’s why real Bop is mad, wild, frantic, crazy—and not to be dug unless you’ve seen dark days, too. Folks who ain’t suffered much cannot play Bop, neither appreciate it. They think Bop is nonsense—like you. They think it’s just crazy crazy. They do not know Bop is also MAD crazy, SAD crazy, FRANTIC WILD CRAZY—beat out of somebody’s head! That’s what Bop is. Them young colored kids who started it, they know what Bop is.”

“Your explanation depresses me,” I said.

“Your nonsense depresses me,” said Simple.

Formals and Funerals

Formals and Funerals

SUDDENLY spring had turned off cold again. The day after Easter it was drizzling rain. Easter Monday night I was standing under the Theresa Hotel’s protecting canopy watching the cars cutting and curving around each corner at 125th and Seventh. Simple was walking against the wind with his head down, his coat collar up, and his hat dripping.

“Where are you going this cold night with the rain raining and the elements blowing?” I asked.

“Hi, there!” he said. “I am ankling to the flower shop to buy a corsage. Come on with me.”

“In this rain! Are you simple?”

“Somewhatly,” he said, “but I got to do it.”

“So you and Joyce are going out sporting this evening, I divine.”

“You know it’s not me and no other woman,” said Simple. “I certainly would not spend Ten Dollars for a corsarge for nobody else, even if she is paying half of it herself.”

“You mean to say Joyce has to go halfers on her own corsage,” I asked, “when you are taking her out?”