Pathos:
Qualities of a work that evokes pity or sorrow. An excess of pathos can create over-emotionalism.


Example:
Incident
Once riding in old Baltimore,
Heart-filled, head-filled with glee;
I saw a Baltimorean
Keep looking straight at me.

Now I was eight and very small,
And he was no whit bigger,
And so I smiled, but he poked out
His tongue, and called me, "Nigger."

I saw the whole of Baltimore
From May until December;
Of all the things that happened there
That's all that I remember.

-Countee Cullen


Explanation:
Cullen describes the speaker and the other boy as equal, as if nothing was different between them, even though at that time color was a big difference. The young boy does not know this, and is crushed when he smiles at a white boy, and the boy makes fun of him. This poem, and especially the second stanza is a prime example of pathos. The reader feels bad, and takes pity on the speaker. This is the prime purpose of this poem, Cullen wants people to see the inequality and cruelty shown towards African Americans, and appealing to the readers sense of pathos is the best way to do that.