Isolated questions

 My heart sinks. I sigh long to release air!

Why am I feeling suffocated?

My heart throbs fast and fast, beats violently

What am I angry about?

My hands drip with sweat, shake, spill my coffee content
on my Chevening cup, what am I anxious about?

My eyes gleam with tears, fighting them back forcefully

What am I crying for?

Is it colour, colour?
what colour?
or is it blood, blood? 
what blood?


Should I be mad?
 why go mad? 
or should I just grieve?
 why grieve?

Should I just ask?
 why ask

isolated questions?

Sounding grateful

 Three days before Christmas,

I took a picture of someone’s head in the bar

and said: “your head looks like Sherwood Forest

 with some serious deforestation taking place."

it was best, I advised, he made it bushy green!

“You want to spoil my Christmas?”  

I said ,“no, it is a Christmas gift.”

he patted me on the back and left.

It was just three or four hours to lunch,
when we took a dog for a walk.
as Bertie sniffs some wet grass we took  more pictures,
as we begin to come back home, our minds ring:

Turkey, sausages, cabbages and chicken soup
 to dip into warm homemade brown bread.

When we sat over table to open gifts
my friend got as a gift an iron  bronze
 in the image of man, holding a spear
 this  is contrasted with a wooden dolphin.

when I opened my box
I got red winter cuffs, matched

 with a warm woollen Scottish scarf,

a white envelope with these words:

 ‘good luck with your studies!’

and then a pack of chillis
and a book on Sudanese history.

  

In Wales, I received a warm winter shirt

 With Kangaroo pockets, a winter coat

With cat furs and some more quids
Then my holiday ended with a simple abuse

 From a drunk sweet looking lady, sprawled on

 the wet toilet floor of the local Welsh bar:

“Piss quick and go to hell!”

She stood up and blew,

Cigarette smoke into my face.

“Are you playing with me?” 

 “No. It is your late secret Santa.” 

The Scottish Wind

 blows long, I hear her

She communicates in a language

 I feel – Wii-Wii!

South. North. East. West.

Are you blowing on the roof of my neighbour’s home?

Are you blowing into my neighbour’s window too?

Are you blowing into the electricity post?

 Are you blowing into the window pane?

 Are you just blowing?

Anyway, what does it matter?

Blow, oh wind, blow,

My lowly spirit rises high

When it hears your Wii-Wii–

Lord Do Not Come

We are not ready for you.

One hand claps

Politicians keep promises

Families live together as friends

Your word is cherished

The poor we support.

My Granny’s Song on Her Deathbed

Black bird, lead the way

Black bird, lead the way

Tell my brothers I am dead

Tell my brothers I am dead.

Black bird, pass my message

Black bird, pass my message

Tell my brothers I am no more

Tell my brothers I am no more.

Black bird, go

Black bird, go

Tell my brothers I am dead

Tell my brothers I am dead.

The tooth

Brother, sister,

Does it matter what color your tooth is?

Is it not the rest of a dental formation?

Is it not the same function the tooth serves?

It should be with this country:

Whatever culture, skin, religion

Or attitudes each of us harbor

----we are South Sudanese.

Watchmen

They mock me

 who fought for this land.

They laugh at me

 who had no chance

 to go to school.

They shout me to watch

The door as they sway and fart

 On the chairs!

The Young Eland

It was two years after, when they told me
that he was drunk when he said: 

"we fought for freedom so beings could go free"
then he set the young eland free.

The little animal ran out of the palace fence
and happily jumped from road to road 
hoping to find a forest.

But the body guards knew 
they knew that their boss was just drunk
So, when the boss fell down in the cell
and began to snore, they carried him to his bedroom
and ran after the little animal, caught him
and brought him back to his cell

It was then that I fought with my mind
I said: "Who brought you here?

 Who took you away from your family?

 Who sold you? Poor li’le eland,
 now  you wander in the city 
with no close forests and your parents far away.

You only run in the circle of the larger cell in the fence,
 like a blind man taping his path to freedom."

TECHNOLOGY

We cannot say wait

We cannot say go.

The world narrows

As you advanced –

– This Country forms

 Part of the narrowing world

Oh, technology,

Do not be such a freak, come on!

 You think we must fear or suspend?

You think we must crawl or whine

 While the world moves fast?

The little old owl and I

 The love we had before

 Smells like a rotten egg long left in the fridge.

The lonely dark night

 Swallows me sitting

 Under this tree

 The wet rain dams me...

 While the little old owl

On a fig tree above me

 Is hooting low...

Why little old owl, 

Do you cry this low?

 Is it the rain? 

Or has your love too, 

Become a rotten egg?

Crying in Vain

 In my home country South Sudan

Right now, lunacy looms high,
As killing rage in all towns.

In this country recently out of war,

Everyone is a hero as bottled up cowardice
Is suddenly sprung up
With the silence of the gun fires in the land,
and they are shouting, cutting each other down...

Someone says, we cannot be quiet about it!
But I hear Mark Anthony 
shout in his grave:Be careful 
how you waggle your tongue, Cicero;
--it may cut off your head.

I hear them wail,
Oh God! Oh Almighty!
What do we do, where do we go?

I say in my heart
Country folks, 

Stay calm.
Stay calm.
Stay calm.

Clock Tick!

Clock Tick! Tick!

 But time never comes by!

Clock tick, tick all the time

 But time never comes by!

Clock tick, tick – never end!

But my mind is on you my love.

Alarm Clock

My name is alarm 

I am strict

My name is alarm

I am strict

 But you are not a cock crow;

 The cock crow crows like a crow

 In exact three times without fail.

No wonder,

 No wonder.

Your first name

 Does not crack

 Like clock

But sounds

 Like sleep some more.

April 1

 

The heat was cooled down

 Fire was extinguished

 As my old boy and I

 Had it our old way –

Even though he is naughty,

 He deserved the chance.

However, should he have fooled himself

 Thinking everything is all right now

And does things his old foolish way,

Without a hint, I will withdraw

My love!

Pre-Naivasha days

 

We used to fight flies and heat  In the bullet ridden grass thatched huts, We lived in the hope of milk and honey. We tried to share the little we got with guerrilla forces Who lived in hope too and tried To survive with little or no food and water   Tyre sandals for shoes and old clothes looted or donated.  The signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement united us.    Yes! We were united: together, Army and ordinary Citizens. We decorated our bodies with ostrich feathers; We danced and smiled, we laughed and celebrated  Together, we ate, together we drank,  Together we poured libations to bless the spirits  Of the fallen heroes buried or abandoned. The Guerrilla Generals-turned-Politicians Cruised the V-8 vehicles in our new dustbowl They swim amidst ill-hooked wealth, Cool Juba heat with the air conditioners Chilling out of the newly furnished  Bungalows and palaces.  We fight flies and fan off the airless heat in congested  Tin roofed shelters without ceiling boards  And ventilated window --after Naivasha Days.

A Simple Kuthia

 To you who say I should pull out of Panthou,
 To you who threaten with fiscal sanctions,
 To you who say Panthou is not mine
 I ask you 'Where the hell is Panthou?  

Let me tell you: Panthou is my home

That man, who was an illegal occupant – remains one.

To you who say I should withdraw
understand my history, listen to wisdom;

Listen well, you who say I should pull out

If one wants to move into his old homestead,

 It is futile to say to the illegal occupant: Go away! Off my land!

Simply put down a kuthia in the garden

 If the illegal occupant is wise, he will evacuate

-- the land.

 This poem is inspired by the Sudan and South Sudan's conflict over Panthou. Panthou was annexed to Kordofan in the late 1970’s, following the discovery of oil in the region and renamed Heglig. South Sudan recaptured Heglig in April 2012. However, the international community, ordered an unconditional withdrawal of  South Sudanese army from Heglig. South Sudan withdrew just after ten days of occupation.   

Dilemma

 Walking by the riverside,

 Imagining dark eyes,

 Tiny fish in Blue Ocean,

 Crocodiles struggling to feed,

Hippos in the deep,

Waiting for the night to come.

 Young Calypso suddenly appeared

 In her flying dress,

Balancing a water jar – and singing.

 I tried to stop her just to say, “Hello.”

The water jar dropped, water flooded the green grass

Forcefully uprooting and clearing weeds back to river.

Calypso’s voice rang: “Daddy!  Daddy!

 He has raped me.”

I saw gigantic hands

 Hold me by the throat.

A man in uniform

 Manacled my hands.

 Three years later

The man with gigantic

hands died; he left a letter,

Urging  me to promise him

 A grandchild.   

Imperial Hotel

 We drove through
the road's hunchback.

And injured the car
it groaned.

In the parking lot,
the prostitute

Pestered
For money. 

To the Wedding Angels

As you promise, 'I do'
my mind reflects the wedding
I lost and the dresses

I burnt.

As the Camera man takes your images
your beautiful pictures
remind me of the beauty
of the wedding day

I lost. 

A Kikumi

I did not know the importance of a kikumi

which I throw away every time I pass 
the half naked poor sprawled on the street floor
 in the boiling heat and eye tearing wind
 on the dusty roads downtown Kampala until the day
I did not have it myself.

That leper with short limbs and downcast gaze
extended her metallic dish to me:
she was expecting a kikumi.
But I awarded her a runaway expression
I could not throw a kikumi into her dish

I was also looking for a kikumi.

NOTE: (kikumi = USh 100)


This revised poem was first published by Studio Edirisa on 31 Aug, 2010