Another Country

by James Baldwin

They strike one, above all, as giving no account of themselves in any terms already consecrated by human use; to this inarticulate state they probably form, collectively, the most unprecedented of monuments; abysmal the mystery of what they think, what they feel, what they want, what they suppose themselves to be saying. HENRY JAMES

He was crying, silently, and he bent forward, hiding his face with one long hand. “I know I failed him, but I loved him, too, and nobody there wanted to know that. I kept thinking, They’re colored and I’m white but the same things have happened, really the same things, and how can I make them know that?” “But they didn’t,” she said, “happen to you because you were white. They just happened. But what happens up here”—and the cab came out of the park; she stretched her hands, inviting him to look—“happens because they are colored. And that makes a difference.” And, after a moment, she dared to add, “You’ll be kissing a long time, my friend, before you kiss any of this away.”

Istanbul, Dec. 10, 1961