Kenyan Ramblings

• The Decision

  Posted: May 18, 2008, 2:33 pm by Tafsiri Hii

  PANGA: to plan,
  to organise,
  to arrange,
  to prepare.
  
  PANGA: metal glinting in the sun,
  a large metallic object with a wooden handle,
  knife's older brother,
  a machete.
  
  PANGA! Eyes fiery red, his strong fingers curl into a fist
  PANGA! He looks but he does not see
  PANGA! He remembers limbs cruelly seperated from bodies, blood as red and as rich as earth
  
  Closing his eyes, he gives in the hated thoughts, the dreaded memories
  Ear-piercing, never-ending, mournful screams of his mother-sister-daughter-wife-aunt-lover
  He ponders, mulls over the irony of women singing dirges at their own deaths
  (Those sad grieving women) with the wrong last names, the wrong skin tone, of the wrong ethnic group
  
  PANGA! He clenches and unclenches his hand
  PANGA! He looks down and tightly grips the object in his other hand
  PANGA! A nerve threatens to pop out of his head
  
  He considers, and reconsiders
  His hand slowly releases the object and allows it to fall
  PANGA. He chooses the future
  He chooses to plan
  He chooses life.
  
  – All rights reserved©

• Uncle (Or, Caught in the Fact)

  Posted: May 18, 2008, 1:40 pm by Tafsiri Hii

  Did he see us, did he hear us?
  He said nothing -
  but avoided my eyes
  So, he knew he knew he knew
  
  Foolish, to leave your shoes by the door
  No other men in the house, except him and my brother
  My brother's young feet cannot fit in those Size 10 shoes
  And my uncle, he does not own dirt brown sneakers in Size 10
  So, he knew he knew he knew
  
  Foolish of us too, to close all windows and lock all doors
  We did not hear him approach
  Neither did we hear him knock one, two, ten times
  Too busy exploring each other's bodies with maddening urgency
  Me, barely out of my teens and recently discovered the joy of two bodies joining
  You, full of energy and virility
  
  So we kept him waiting, knocking
  Until we were spent, our combined sweat forming rivulets
  Only then did we hear his knocking....
  Do you think he told Ma?
  
  
  - 2008. Not for Publication or Distribution -
  

• The Possibilities

  Posted: May 18, 2008, 1:14 pm by Tafsiri Hii

  And so I walked
  Soon, to come across a lot
  A sizeable piece of land, really
  Half, a grassy field
  The other half, naked soil
  
  As lush as the grass was on the left,
  As tantalising as the fruit on the trees looked,
  As soothing as the shadow beneath those trees seemed,
  I could not resist the soil's call.
  
  I turned to the right and went to the bare patch
  The earth was warm, reddish-brown and smelt of possibilities
  Without hesitation or due forethought,
  I untied my shoelaces, pulled up my pants
  And sunk my greedy feet into the inviting earth
  It spoke to me:
  "Here, a crop to feed the nation,
  There, a shop to sell your harvest,
  There, next to the spring, a picnic with your love,
  Here, herbs that would heal the ill,
  Over there, a place you would call home,
  Here, somewhere to bury your dead."
  
  With my eyes shut and my feet planted into the soil,
  My mind easily slipped into a world of 'what ifs'
  Regrettably, I peeled open my eyelids, rolled down my torn trousers and put my worn shoes back on.
  I bade goodbye to my friend the soil,
  And walked on.....
  
  - 2008. Not for Publication or Distribution -

• Three Thousand

  Posted: May 18, 2008, 12:51 pm by Tafsiri Hii

  What do you know about laws –
  You who fall asleep instead of making them
  Mouths wide open,
  Legs spread-eagled,
  Hands on bellies,
  Bellies full of rich 3 course meals; threatening to pop out of 300-dollar shirts
  Eyes tightly shut;
  Dreaming, dreaming of more money to steal, more houses to buy, more women to fuck
  A siesta at 3 o’clock…after a tryst with your 3rd mistress
  Fat cats.
  
  You who dare arrest a woman
  For buying a 30-shilling loaf off the streets:
  An unthinkable crime!
  Guilty: she, of wanting to feed her family
  And the hawker, of peddling goods and struggling to survive
  Illegal, you say
  Selling goods without a license
  Chaotic too:
  Law and order are necessary in a civilised society!
  A fine of 3,000 shillings for the crime of buying a 30-shilling item:
  An amount that she can only dream of ever blessing her eyes upon,
  Her salary for 3 months,
  Not nearly enough to feed her family of 13 for a week,
  Fools.
  
  Yet you wonder why
  Her sons grow up to steal from you, kill you
  Her boys, they had so much potential
  Could have replaced you and done a better job too!
  Farmers, architects, artists, leaders: their future down the drain
  Their euphoria short-lived, when they realise that you are all words and no actions
  Where are the 300,000 jobs that you promised to create if they voted for you?
  They still have no access to free education
  So they join gangs and attack you
  After all, a young boy is restless and can remain idle for so long
  What other choice is there?
  Felons.
  
  Why are they so unhappy, when the economy has grown by 3%?
  These 30 million people, living from hand to mouth
  The rich getting richer, the sick getting sicker, the prices soaring high
  Why would they care about abstract concepts like the GDP?
  You congratulate yourselves and award yourselves by increasing your salaries
  (Big men need big cars)
  Draining an overstretched public reserve
  That is replenished occasionally by your foreign friends
  But nothing comes for free: your friends have their conditions
  They will rape your women, rob you, run you out of business and erode your culture
  Only then can you appreciate the extent of their generosity, their ‘aid’
  They laugh at you behind your backs, you know
  Your so-called friends, they laugh at you
  They have many words to describe your country,
  A country teetering on the edge, like a drunken woman balancing on high heels
  Threatening to fall over any minute.
  
  
  - October 2007. Not for Publication or Distribution -
  – All rights reserved©

Blah blah blah

Fish cakes

Alas a fish cake.

Yet more fish cakes

Guess what ... yeah ... fish cakes.

The end of the fish cakes