balls & calisthenics, gravel roads
& foul-mouthed children. Day
after day of George Little or some
other white man telling me what
I should do. I don’t need a trainer
& I don’t need a manager. I can do
for myself. The manly art is a yawner.
What else can I get from it?
I’d rather be touring with Etta,
playing the viol in Scranton, Buffalo,
Rochester—wherever it pays to be
who I am: the Heavyweight
Champion of the World.
Do you understand, Shadow?
See, that’s why Jeffries is going to put it
on you, Mr. Heavyweight. You never wanted
to be a prize fighter. You just wanted the prize.
THE BATTLE OF THE CENTURY
Jack Johnson vs. Jim Jeffries, July 4, 1910
Round One
The fourth day of July & the sun can’t hide
in the blue. James Jeffries can’t hide either.
That’s why he drew the color line when
he was champion. That’s why he retired
& bought an alfalfa farm. Excuse after excuse
to avoid me, even when that writer London begged
him to take the championship back for the white
race—It’s up to you, Jeff! Jeffries was busy
hitching a plow in Burbank. Jeffries wanted
none of it then & being in the ring with me
didn’t convince him to reconsider. He brought
the clinching game as soon as the bell rang:
half wrestling, half jostling for any opening
to rabbit punch. No leads, but he feinted
some & leaned on me like we were dancing
partners. Someone yelled, Cut out the motion
pictures! & the bell rang. I smiled, patting
his shoulder on the way back to my corner.
One last gentlemanly gesture before the hurt.
Round Two
Jim Corbett paced outside the ring
like one of those circus tigers before
the man with the whip shows up.
He kept yelling nigger as if name-
calling could move me when Jeffries
couldn’t. Corbett must not have heard
the band playing “All Coons Look
Alike” when I split the ropes.
I’ve heard this same song my whole life.
When the usual offenses didn’t work,
Corbett said unrepeatable things
about my mother, hoping to make me
fight wild. I snapped Jeffries’s head
back with a right & Corbett said,
He wants to fight a little, Jim. I gave
Jeffries another right to the gut, then
a left to the face. You bet I do, I told
them all. Waiting lathers a man up.
Jeffries stretched out that long left paw of his, crouching a little
to put the scare of a crotch punch in me. A red-hot sun poured
down on our heads. All the while, he chewed a piece of gum
like a milk cow chews cud. When he finally came at me, I shifted
left, hit him so hard with a left uppercut he had to hang on me
like a museum picture hangs on a nail to keep from falling out
right then. All right, Jim, I told him. I’ll love you if you want me to.
Round Three
I knew before
the fight I would
hurt Jeffries, but
hurt wasn’t enough.
I wanted to take
the man’s pride
like a horse’s bridle
& send him into
the river. Him
& anyone fool
enough to think
a four-flushing
alfalfa farmer
could beat Jack
Johnson. Starting
the third round, I
taunted loud enough
for everyone to hear:
Come on now, Jim.
Let me see what
you got. Jeffries
got so mad he rushed
me & I planted
a left on his jaw
for his troubles.
I got a couple of rabbit
rights in before
the referee pulled
us apart. I smiled
at Jeffries—big,
so he & all of his
supporters could see
my gold dentistry—
& said again, Show
me what you got,
Mr. Jeff. This is
for the championship.
Round Four
The bell rang & Jeffries hit me with a left-handed lead to the stomach
that sounded like an automobile crash. My insides felt like they felt
when Clara left me broke & humiliated in St. Louis. After each punch,
the crowd yelled as if Jeffries’s fists were Independence Day fireworks.
When he caught my mouth with a left, the cut Kid gave me during
training opened again. The crowd saw blood & hollered even louder.
First blood for Jeff! Jeffries was getting in work, but Reno is not St. Louis.
His fists weren’t up to the full task. Don’t rush me, Jimmy, I told him.
You hear what I’m telling you? He did color my gold smile with a little red.
Round Five
I let Jeffries have his bloody mouth right
back. Only he wasn’t smiling after. If he would
have, it wouldn’t have been pretty.
Round Six
A left hook cut Jeffries’s right cheek.
A straight left blocked up his right eye.
A beaten fighter’s blood on my glove
sprinkled in dust. The sun. A beaten
fighter wrapped up, pushed back into
his corner. An angry crowd burning
to a crisp. I asked Corbett where he
wanted me to drop his broken fighter,
but Corbett didn’t want to mouth anymore.
Then I heard that reporter Naughton
spelling out the fight for the telegraph:
“Jeffries took a left hook to the jaw.”
I hit Jeffries with another left & a straight
right: Is that all he took, Mr. Naughton?
Round Eight
All these whites booing & boosting
for Jeffries. They slept under café
tables & on blanket-covered billiard
tables for this? They knew their farmer
was whipped & their rent money
was lost & that knowledge brought
out the worst in that unruly crowd.
Between the name-calling, the swirls
of dust, & descriptions of my demise
after the fight ended, I could hear
the one voice that mattered: Etta
screaming over & over, Keep it up, Jack!
Round Nine
Every time I jabbed Jeffries,
he ducked lower, until I thought
he might just lay down right there.
The crowd was still booing,
so I waved & said, I’ll straighten
him up here in a minute. Sweat
all over me & Nevada dust sticking
to me. The dust in Jeffries’s cuts
made him look a little less beaten.
Someone in the crowd hollered,
“He’ll straighten you up, nigger!”
Even after nine rounds of me
beating on their boy, they still didn’t
see he was only standing because
I let him. I stepped in & gave Jeffries
the kind of uppercut that makes
a prize fighter stand up straight
& question his profession.
Jeffries’s mouth was so swollen he looked
like the newspaper versions of me. Through
those cartoon lips, he tried to talk: Ain’t I
got a hard old head? I hit him with two rights
& agreed: You certainly have, Mr. Jeffries.
Round Ten
The bell rang & Jeffries
came out determined
to go down fighting. As if
he had a choice. He came
out in that crouch with a frown
like he ate a piece of bad fish.
After he missed a couple
of blind swings I asked,
Jimmy, are you mad?
Round Twelve
Mr. Jeffries refused to give in. There wasn’t much
difference between his face & the meat on a butcher’s
table. & he kept coming, like a bull that knows what
happens after the fight. I just moved out of the way,
shook some of the dust off his face with punches
as he passed. Corbett was as hysterical as a woman:
It only takes one or two, Jeff! So I gave Jeffries
a quick right to the face, let it sink in for a minute,
then hit him with two more & said, See that?
Round Fourteen
Questions bring as much hurt
as fists do: How you like ’em,
Jim? Left hook instead
of a question mark. Did that
hurt? Right then left, straight
to the face like a Galveston wind.
Was that your nose that just
broke? Right jab, then
a crunching like eggshells.
Round Fifteen
Jeffries didn’t have anything left
to give, so he tried to spit on me.
Dust & blood where there should
have been spit. He tried to clinch
me again & I let him have a left
for trying. His nose was broken
& in that friendless Nevada sun,
he couldn’t find any wind. I pushed
him away & gave him both hands.
I hit him so hard the free lookers
on the hill above the stadium
could hear it clearly. The farmer
fell back into the ropes, then
headed for his corner the same
way a horse heads back to the barn.
I caught him with an uppercut
& three fast lefts to the ribs.
Jeffries dropped to his knees
like old fruit from a tree & grabbed
the last rope. The referee counted
nine before Jeffries pulled himself up.
Don’t let the nigger knock him out!
Don’t let the nigger knock him out!
As soon as the referee moved, I tried
to punch through Jeffries. He went down
again, back & through the ropes. As if
the ropes could protect him from me.
Don’t let the nigger knock him out!
Don’t let the nigger knock him out!
Jack Jeffries & one of the other corner boys helped
his brother off the canvas. The younger Jeffries must
not have appreciated his brother because he pushed
Jim right back into the ring. Jim swayed there like a tree
about to fall in a storm. I heard Corbett yell, Don’t,
Jack. Don’t hit him! so I hit Jeffries four more times
for the things Corbett said about my mother. I stood
over Jim with my right ready, so he could see what
to expect if he could still see. The white towel was in
the ring before the referee finished counting him out.
As his seconds helped him up, I heard Jeffries saying,
I couldn’t come back, boys. I couldn’t come back.
RACE RELATIONS
The president of Talladega College
said it was better for me to have
beaten Jeffries & let a few coloreds
be murdered in the riots than for me
to lose & allow their spirits to be killed.
I quit fifth grade to load cotton steamers
& even I know the spirit is no good
without the body. All that violence
just because my black fists were too many
for a pair of white fists. If they had any
manhood, these people wouldn’t fight
at all. The truth is, whites are supposed
to know better on general principle.
The fellows making trouble over
my victory at Reno didn’t have anything
to do with it & they don’t have any class.
If they knew the real Jack Johnson,
they’d behave themselves, like he does.
MARRIAGE PROPOSAL
Etta Duryea
Hit goes Papa like a steam
engine that lost its track.
Hit goes Papa in some hotel
in Ohio somewhere. Gaston’s
run off, so the show is over.
Hit goes Papa: Ain’t I a prince?
The Prince of Darkness hits
like Papa. Only to the stomach
& back hits Papa. I know
about Gaston—hit hit hit. No
babies, thanks to Papa’s hits.
Hit goes Papa until all
I see is Papa marrying me.
ARISTOCRACY
Etta Duryea
If I had a gun, I’d treat Papa
like a duck in a Long Island
duck hunt. If I had a gun,
I would provide myself
the same kindness enemy soldiers
are provided. What I want
is a metallic way back to before.
When I close my eyes, I dream
gold teeth fanned like a rainbow
in the afternoon. When I was
in the back room with Gaston,
I heard a gold smile around
every color. If I had a gun—
COMPROMISES
Excerpt from Belle Schreiber’s interview with Agent T. S. Marshall. October 30, 1912
I have to ask again. Did Mr. Johnson ever promise you anything for your company?
That smoke promised all kinds of things. A bathtub full of jewels. Money for my own sporting house. I never got any of it. He brought me on the road with him and put me up at whatever two-bit hotel was near where he stayed with Etta. I had to pay the bill and keep the hotel receipts so he would pay me back. What a gentleman.
Was Ms. Duryea aware of Mr. Johnson’s infidelity?
I believe so, but when she caught us together, Papa acted like I was a lunatic, following him around. If I didn’t go along with it, he’d beat me the next time we were alone. Our relations finally ended when Etta gave him a real ultimatum. The next day, he gave me $500 and a train ticket and that was it. I saw him at a horse track last year and he said he wasn’t married to Etta. I knew he was. Papa never cared about any of us. From her last actions, Etta seemed to finally understand that fact.
THE SHADOW KNOWS
I know this isn’t how you
thought things would go
when you were joyriding
Wabash Ave
nue in the Flyer,
all those white women
hanging out of your auto
like streamers at a party.
I bet you imagined you’d
always be the Galveston
Giant, the Champion Negro
drinking champagne with
your breakfast eggs, a cigar
huffing like a smokestack.
A straight sport even in old
age: white three-piece on the bed
where Etta carefully laid it.
You could see it all then,
like one of those burlesque
shows in Paris. Come on, now.
White folks didn’t like you
before you whipped Jeffries
& black folks lost appreciation
for your golden magnanimousness
the minute your gallivanting
got somebody killed. Satisfaction
is its own cold consequence.
Hate to tell you, but that gorgeous
left hook don’t mean a thing
to the agents & their Mann Act.
You’re going to jail & dragging
me with you. What’s the guff,
Mr. Heavyweight Negro?
No repartee now that the law
is kicking at your door?
REMEMORY
I’ve forgotten some prize fights
& the names of men I beat more
than they beat me, but how can
I forget Divine Intervention
with a scar dividing my thigh
like Wabash splits Chicago?
That horse back-kicked so hard
my leg bone broke, split my skin
like a lazy plum. I layed back
in that stall, bleeding & hollering
in the dirty hay, with that horse
looking over his shoulder at me
like it was my fault & the flies
& the flies’ humming stuttering
like telegraph type until Jim
found me. I couldn’t tolerate horses
after that. The scar is purple now
& jagged as a pant’s hem.
Even though the bone healed
all right, I rub the scar for luck.
The Big Smoke Page 4