St. Paul recorder. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1934-2000, 1962-10-05
FIay or Pray
BY LANGSTON HUGHES

Tooth by tooth, before you can
turn around, it is gone" said
Simple sadly.
What" 1 asked.
your youth-hood," said simple.
with some mems, it goes hair by
hair. I hope I never get bald
headed and toothless both"
You probably will in due time"
I said. Every time the dentist
pulls a tooth, ten years is gone"
said Simple.
That is hardly true" I said,
THE average man has 80 teeth
in his head. Ten times 80 equals
800. And nobody has that many
years to live. Besides, some people
keep all Of their teeth until they
die"
Some live snaggled-toothed till
the end of their days" said Simple.
They keep just enough teeth to
get in the way of a plate"
"They are foolish" said. Bad
teeth are a health hazard and
they ought to come out"
There are plenty of things in a
mans head that ought to come
out" declared Simple, like evil
thoughts, and imagining you is
more than you is, and getting
stuckup and important, therefore.
Also, prejudice should come out"
II thought you would bring race
into our deliberations" I said.
But you can't pull prejudice out
of a mans head like you can
teeth. No dentist living can do
that"
REV. Martin Luther King tries
to pray prejudice out, but some
times 1 think we are going to flay
it out" said Simple.
violence never solved any
thing" 1 contended. you can't
beat attitudes, racial or otherwise,
out of peoples heads.
Deep seated fixations are mat
ter for the psychiatrists and
psychologists, not bully boys with
clubs"
Nor policemen with dogs?"
mo, nor policemen with dogs"
I affirmed.
MANY a Negroes seat has been
frayed by dog, though, and many
a Negroes head has been flayed
by a billy club, and many black
souls on the way to the polls have
been stopped by a cop who said,
Stay away! Don't vote today
because they might cause a riot.
Then the Negroes go back home,
their minds changed about the
ballot. Clubs have changed many
Negroes mind down South. How
come they can't change white
minds ?"
violence, brute force never
changed any Negro minds at all.
Negroes still hold the same
thoughts silently in the face of in
timidation. They just don't exer-
else their prerogatives at this
time"
I'm other words, they don't vote
in Mississippi. They are scared to
vote. But it looks Nike to me,
said Simple, "as many Negroes
as there are in Mississippi, they
would make the white folks scared
to try to make the Negroes scared.
If all them down-home colored
folks was to rise up in one mass.
you don't believe in Rev. Kings
policies of non-violence, I gather"
only for the non-violent," said
Simple. WAS I down South in the
thick of things, me, would lose
my temper"
You would lose your head" I
said.
Il am afraid I would" said
Simple. IT have been up here in
the free North too long to go
down there to the unfree South.
But I will contribute money"
"Side-line fighter" said. Talk
err at the big gate! Advocate of
violence against your white broth
ersw
white brothers? The closest I
could come to a white relative
would be a twenty-second cousin
on my Indian grandmother's side,
said Simple.
your Indian grandmother"
Eyes, they said in our family
that grandma was descended from
Pocahuntas who were married to
Capt. John Smith - and Smith
were white"
"So?"
80 that would make his white
brothers children's grandchildren
my twenty-second cousins. And,
relatives or not, I would raise my
hand against them, was they to
segregate me-"
"F1ay take it would be your
attitude, rather than pray"
IT have already prayed" said