Nairobi is a quick lover

 First flash: a business-bright billboard smile;

A suit far too neat for the jam on Jogoo Road;

A suit too well knit, too well fitting, too good

For anyone real.

Then he moves- inside the billboard-

Two steps forward, one to the side

Hand glides out of pocket with a slide

Phone. Best leg forward. Pose.

 

(") Pause.

Nairobi stops to watch, to save to memory

This magic of a man - perfection personified.

This memory merges with others in vogue:

The hunky hero on movie magic,

A one-time White House guest turned iconic,

The muscled advert-face relic

And any other on any magazine

In Nairobi or any city else.

 

(>) Play

Feet fall close in a life so fast paced-

Nairobi eyes are bewitched with contact allergy

Like a bad case of cross-eyes.

They are busy eyes.

Shoulders meet hard and repel

Jostling for that wear; that look

Dying to catch Mr. Nairobi's eye-

Actually dying.

 

 When he breathes,

women save for steam irons

For the latest tights on watched weights.

The gyms pack full, lunch spots close shop.

When Nairobi raises his eyes

Women raise their hems.

 

 Boutique prizes up-shift.

Credit  firms reach-out to you, brother:

A thousand eyes eying a single image

With similar need, fast-bred greed-

To have a neat lawn- by a street swept daily at dawn

To park in the mezzanine- a concept car.

(Property agents drop bellies fast.)

To have the next technology now. Now!

The Messaging-optimised E-series with 4G

For sms, for facebook and for flashing with glee!

Or the 2TB HDD, 8GB RAM, 3.2 Ghz Core i7

For single finger snail-typing,

gaming and getting you the 'Lo!'

From that impossible work mate -

Never mind the fortune

Nairobi likes you looking great!

And anyways, for the neighbour's eye,

What’s too dear to buy?

Be it a tool or a ruse!

Mustn’t you pay for but hardly use

In Nairobi?

 

In the catch-my-eyes dance

Ubuntu dies and is buried at Kimathi's feet,

To keep stillborn uhuru company.

But Nairobi's a walking city,

Or a one-train-a-day affair,

Matatus shuttling at capacity,

In a jam with single-occupant cars,

 

And for a single moment, you look like him-

Or right for him.

You are ecstatic, you are Nairobi!

 Or Nairobi's newest whore

Angel-looking

High-heeled

Sleek-suited

UAE-cologned

On-demand smiling

Junk-fed

Over-worked

Overspending

Man and woman.

Nairobi will bed you quick!

Then fire you

Then sue you for bankruptcy

Then auction your concept car

Then you hit the road -

A truly fulfilled fool!

A truly fulfilled fool!

The Forgotten Bomb

(Adapted into Madonna’s song ‘Don’t Cry for Me Argentina’’s tune: Don’t cry for me, oh my daddy The truth is i will leave you This is my youthfulness Troubled existence You’ve kept your distance And i have lost my patience) Do you know your son? Flesh and blood your own? Burning ambition to build this nation? The skill in these hands- The will to toil our lands? Fears, frightful frustrations; Pain of remaining forgotten Unconsulted, untended Don’t you care? Daddy, sincerely… Must you always brush by? Push me away; Kick me aside like a stone in your way? Then briskly…phew! *** “To ‘men’s business’, diligent engagements And I promise -before my demise The surest bequest -for you my dearest: A top job That house on the hill, For a car - a Hummer.” *** “But when…?” *** “Your time will come Till then, be calm! *** Morning after morning A decade of identical mornings A pile of empty promises- And I have felt small- Unremarkable; Like the lightest dust On the tiniest tin On the lowest shelf I have groped into darkness dragged into drugs by idleness; Attempted suicide instead, died inside! Yearning for the sky But falling anyway While you were away *** “Minding our economy; minting money Taming our climate; changing our fate Am a busy daddy, wait till 2030!” *** (Adapted into Kidum’s song ‘Penzi la Fujo’s tune: M i na shangaa, wewe ukisema Eti unanipenda, hali unanitesa, Si vizuri daddy wewe kuwa nafiki Mbona hujajaribu kurekebisha Bila hivyoimekuwa mateso Ya kunikera, najihisi sifaii ii! Consequently I’ve felt inconsequent! Essentially inessential! I have felt like nothing Lost in a pile of…nothing! I have felt…feelingless! But while I lay prostrate Beaten, smitten, desperate; Looking for a place to hide my face What did I find! Myspace! Facebook- the new face of friendship! Twitter- calling all to fellowship! A voice! A tune! A low rumbling call- Piped in underground tunnels; I listened: revelation! Revolution! Voices south, voices north Young dreams voiced forth… Tunisian, Egyptian, Lybian Music brewing, boiling in hidden pots The sound of a common cry Crying a summon to all A clarion call Decrying a common foe Crying but calling to war- Adapted from Sarafina the Movie song ‘Usulela! Ia!Ulela! Ia! Ia!*2 Suddenly, I am strong! I prance with aplomb The young forgotten bomb Loaded with information Awaiting detonation! You! Yes, daddy, you! The wide world knows You’re immersed in mess after mess Scandal after scandal- Irregular tenders Kickbacks back to back- Party politics-cheap tricks Shameless theatrics And now, says Wikileaks,- It’s just you and The Hague This charge is not vague! Adapted from Shakira song ‘Stamina Mina’: Stamina mina ii! Ii! Waka waka ii ii! Stamina mina zangalewa, it’s time for Africa! But, daddy… Honestly, what of amnesty? But, no! Punishment, not impunity! But daddy…! but no! Come… let go! I do… I do not ! know The music of change Must beat without rage; Repentance, recompense Not pay back but give back. Take my hand now, daddy We must fly away Into a new season In my own vision.

Falling for WAR

Out of darkness of night, peeps she like a star

As a diamond in the dark, dazzles she among tar
She prances forth in virgin allure
Add a whiff of queenly air to her bewitching flair!
Her every sparkle a kiss, every blink a dis!
A slave-faced master, seductive disaster!
Here she crowns a prince, there she hangs a dunce!

In the wind talks her wild perfume
With her beauty we are charmed into doom!
I've heard she's heaven; she is gold and glory-
And that fate faring any way, whether one live or die,
He dies a king or lives a memory.

And she's in town! Yes, and she is down
For me; to me by a magic-wind blown!
And I am suddenly a fretful wreck-
Will it do to just flirt and neck?
What if I forget to draw the blinds,
And the paparazzi tells all it finds?
Can I date Ms. War yet stay off blogs,
Or tabloids that feed my name to the dogs?

I hear she met Peace, his moral fabric yet without crease
But with a single vampire kiss, she turned Peace amiss!
She bewitched that American neighbour, dried him of humour;
His manner once couth, now gone with the breath of youth.
He runs around naked, in a witch-hunt for the wicked
And in their shameless act,  he perverts without tact -
With PMCs and drones, he never has to lose pawns.
Yet so is he lost, though once honoured most

Too late now I assume, she won't have a change of groom 
With negotiations complete, of options 'am all deplete!
To Kismayu we blast off soon, on a harrowing honeymoon.
So shall I have her (I wonder), in a trench or a bunker?
Or is that all old-fashioned now? I wouldn't know.

Whatever she likes, street combat or aerial strikes,
Is all like romancing a sniper; petting the grim reaper.
But so is love and death; found and lost in a single breath 
Either falls from the skies - before you've said your goodbyes
Or blows you off the ground - in many parts all hell-bound!
So, what be the point to hide - from this killer bride?

Even dirt, with a little glitter

If a rock is hard and black

If a tree is large and soft
Must it be granite at heart?
Baobab inside?
Must you scorn it from far
"Miserable Baobab, thou art ungainly fat"
And condescend upon immovable rock,
"Poor thee, I understand thy stubborn stock."

None is what it seems
Thorns sprout by tenderest apples
And are juiciest melons on desert soils
And who would have thought!
You'll find your tongue strayed
as a waif any day
To look at me and judge
Or shower me in praise,
And the leaning Tower of Pisa
Would laugh still at your skewed opinion;
And for judgment, why, you will be bankrupt!

But I wish you the sight
To see steel in a bean pole
To smell perfume in the communal urinal
For contaminated are we all
Even dirt, with
 a little glitter.
Though we jibe and fuss
How thoroughgoing we are
We are breeds crossed of something bad
And something worse.

To  insult me, then,
crack my oak bark

Stand my eucalyptus scent
The itch of poison-oak sap
And pinch of falling thorns.
Still, borrow a giraffe's neck
For my ego sits high on my uppermost twigs
And deep in my pithy stem

Tree lore: 'Why trees are ever standing'

 Hush the swish in your leaves

Tender twig, halt your play

Young trees, slow your sway

Listen to us old wood!

"it wasn't always this cool,

The sun didn't always just shine-

It burned oh! It scorched so!

We withered and wilted and shriveled:

Great Oak and his family cracked

Cedar- all tall and hard-barked,

Bristlecone pine and any other pine

All browned away and dried;

We knelt, lowered our sapped branches

Stretched our weary stalks and just about died.

It was a sad time such-

Cut up and shipped away,

The best of us-

Demeaned and baked into charcoal,

Or lumbered into timber- that vast tomb...

Oh, and cousin Sandal Wood, butchered for perfume!

We lost our graceful poise.

The rains ceased, rivers shrunk

What a season!

Then came along a girl, she of the green heart-

Born of the enemy but turned friend indeed!

Her love green as sap, Her word was her deed.

For every broken twig, she dropped her head

If a tree fell in Karura, she shed

Tears and cried, 'No! 

Desecrate no more!

Our heritage: green beauty of earth!'

The rest is history:

-the rise of the trees, the era of green

Which you, young tree now see-

Bountiful leaves on beautiful boughs,

The earth's safe again,

The state of our nation strong!

This legacy we remember her by

-Wangari wa Maathai-

A girl born of flesh but sprouted green-

Mother of trees!

Forest queen!

Diva in green!

Forever!"

 (As told by a 100 year old Cedar tree in 2092)

My Past

Death, thou art loosed!

My head is full

Of sounds of a shovel

Of sands shoved

Of rocks moved

Of ground punched

To sink a necessary grave-

Unnecessarily too often

Too close to the last

In too dry a ceremony.

The people I’ve buried

Graves I have filled

In song-less haste

In war’s pointless waste

Death is born.

I grope in the past

And my past is lonely and vast

Furnished with misery

Well washed with tears and worry

Ventilated by gusts of terror –

my past is packed to the ceiling with

memory upon memory

loss upon loss

too often in this war-

Stacked atop each as if

they were trophies.

My past is a place

famished then abandoned

By friends and the sun and the wind.

My past is this place I can’t leave

This home I return to

This prison that shadows me

No matter the borders I cross,

This windowless trap

This smothering grip,

This past so vast

Acres and acres of evil in my mind

Poisoning where I walk

What I think, who I meet-

poisoning.

My past is a memory

the smell of blood of kin

stinging pain of singed skin

the sound of a flaring flame

of a flame crack

the harrowing fall of my life.

 With my hands I remember

burying

people I had encountered

bodies I had entered

The hearts I had warmed

In the season of love bloomed,

Lips I’d tasted; the bonds now tested

By death broken, I buried.

I remember

That I have lost to soulless sands

To silent earth

To rocks that clatter,

then roll and settle

to graves that cover

my friends whose fatal

End is an endless bother

 that I couldn’t shrug at all -

this memory so lonely and vast

Is a grave that covers me

For since then, I've been dead

Though I walk-

Thought I walk.

A Dream of Love, Reality of War & Memories of a Street in Libya.

Dear mother,
We are all here, Swaleh, Fuad
Death and I,
Of our own will we stay.
Everything here is momentous-
Friendships firm up overnight over a shared joke,
Daring the desert dust, watching idly smoke -
Idly Life and callous death casually cast lots for us.
And, mum, am in love!

I saw her in a dream- a Libya of open minds!
Of tender hearts, long cast their rinds,
No liege nor royal , no rajah nor vassal
Just us, many men, women and all...
Like the Delta, mile upon mile-
Back bent in a humbled curtsy;
Egypt kissing the sea
Egypt swallowing the Nile!
Just like that.

Oh, but I saw her in an apartment on a hill,
When Misrata came back to us last week.
Right upon the last blast, in the gloom of falling dust -
Foot-soldier in victory drill.
There I was; and she:
fairer than the desert moon
Shinning shyly on the ridge's peak ,
Fairer- than the nightlights of Tripoli.
And my heart will be crashed totally
If it wasn't me she smiled at!

We saved them, mum, from Gadhafi's men.
She must've seen me!
No doubt there.
She like me too, I think.

That's what I think
Everytime a shell comes crashing, or a bullet
Comes tearing; then death among us dances
Squeezing life out, kneading hard without let
Then, mostly then, do we most miss home,
But I, mum, just your water bottle.

For the home street has nothing for me
Whitewashed, sand-lit with neat idleness…
Littered with my bothers,
Swaleh, Fuad and I…
At home but lost, too small:
Like the smallest kiosks
Along the busiest street
In the biggest city!
Who am I in Tripoli?
Where hides hope? Where lies love…?
One can't even die quick!

My dreams, mum, have gone stale
No one needs them.
Someone else always knows better
Someone older always has the platter.
In my home street, I’ve felt even small
Like the lightest dust
On the tiniest tin
On the lowest shelf
Of your shop, mum.
Consequently inconsequent!
Essentially inessential!
I have felt like nothing
Lost in a pile of… nothing!
I have felt… feelingless!

So I won't be home yet!
I will keep my head low and duck fast,
If we must all die, I will die last!
I crouch here in dirt, so you can sit at ease
Allah grant us victory, then I will come in one piece.
But not yet.

Just a little longer, mum.
With every minute Ideas gather, the future coalesces:
From the narrowest hole to the highest crest,
The tamest dune to the wildest tempest-
At sea, on land sighs hope:
Facebook- the new face of friendship!
Twitter- calling all to fellowship!
A voice! A tune! A low rumbling call-
Piped in underground tunnels;
We listen: revelation! Revolution!
Voices south, voices north
Young dreams voiced forth…
Tunisian, Egyptian, Lybian
Music brewing, boiling in hidden pots
The sound of a common cry
Crying a summon to all
A clarion call
Decrying a common foe
Crying but calling to war-
Suddenly, I am strong!

I shall prance with aplomb
The young forgotten bomb!
Left to right ; back and forth
Death or life, water or dust, peace or debris.
I'll think of her, I will miss your water bottle
In the gathering dusk, tobacco smoke and the dawn after;
Hope and nerves.
We shall sit-
Swaleh, Fuad, Death and I
Quietly looking out for a route home-
An honourable route or none at all.

Your son,
Mahmoud 'Bouaziz'

PS. I have since taken my Tunisian hero's name
I have kept my family name, in case I come to fame.
Spare me no pity, just the water bottle, mum.