Friday, May 4, 2012

ABOVE THE FRAY I

KUBURABASU

Da kuburabasu green
Over the years of your poets' dreams
You patched up each fragment of green
From the broken kwamra that everywhere
Held to keep the country green

Then it was time to cultivate the savannah
To speak of green things in mystic chambers
Of voices holding out in the low savannah
And of kindling found among dying embers
For the baking of clay in the high savannah

The hiri would come with its winds
And you would be troubled by its echoeings
Of voices not of the laurabada winds
Wondering if too in such undertakings
Build towers out of trade winds

The sand will see its first morning
Of thatched castles, airborne as islands
Along cliff-faces this morning
And the city will be stone with multiple hands
Juggling severed roofs on a sky-less morning

So you leave us, kuburabasu green
Tropical ruins across this savannah
Hamlets blown ablaze by the winds
And for the morning
OndoBondo on the green

To the memory of Doreen Jiregari


From KWAMRA: a season of harvest




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