WamathaiI’m walking down the alleys of my hood, home. Pretty much not living in the fast lane, but we last. The walls speak insecurity, the ground’s facet, hostile
Animadversion fills the air, as a drunken man beyond apathy blurts out.
There’s a drop of greatness in every man, but in this, there’s gallons… of acerbic moral!
Music is blazing, mama mboga is laughing out loud, and children animatedly engaging in hide and sick; it’s almost a den of tumult.
Men are stealing glances wondering who this rubensque young girl is.
Pray! Some have even undressed me with one look already. So much is running through my mind, it feels like birds chirping in a briar;
Why did papa beat mama up last night?
Are we going to have dinner tonight?
Why haven’t I seen my brother for over a fortnight?
In the conundrum of my thoughts, someone grabs my hand and pulls me aside.
It’s the man… exactly, the drunk! I try to wriggle my way out, but he pins me to the wall and covers my mouth lest I scream;
“Gone in 60 seconds”, oh yeah! I watched it too, great movie, but that aside; my innocence… was gone in 60 seconds. What once was the temple of the Holy Spirit feels like a bordello now.
I run home, on this specific evening my house seems so far yet so near.
I’m home on my bed, I can feel the walls staring in commiseration, our earth floor has absorbed my tears, I’m in pain, it’s indescribable.
Withdrawn in a self-made shell;
Absconded from the real world;
A lax mortal lives in me;
It’s not a proffered culture I’m living in, is it?
Or maybe it’s a rite of passage I know not of;
Pray, years later I still don’t have the courage to speak out;
Eschewal to speak is so much; I don’t wanna be rejected in my hometown.
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