Calm

there's calmness, 

a lulling serenity,

in knowing yourself 

well enough to reckon 

that you're always on 

Your own 

when shit goes down 

A Woman With Balls

  We met a woman with balls. It is a privilege of sorts, because very few people ever do in their lifetime. How did we know, you may ask. We known- get ready for the answer - because she said it. "I have balls!" To quote her verbertim. And you must believe whatever a woman says, especially when she's drunk. And it's in the morning. And she has dreadlocks. 

It was a few months before the 2022 general elections. There was money to be burned. It was not surprising to find people drinking in the morning or in various stages of drunkenness. We were also in the process of catching up, although not on the benovelent pockets of a man or woman craving the debueached walls of Parliament. 

We were seated, silently ruminating about dreams we'd never attain. Unaware, we were on a brisk yet imperceptible march towards alcohol addiction or dependency, whichever you call it. We sipped our cheap beers, unbothered and not bothering anyone. 

It was in the morning, as indicated earlier. Nothing was badass. Nothing beats drinking in the morning, especially when serious tax payers are busy building the economy. We drunk during COVID-19, when all bars were closed. We were so serious no life-threatening disease would stop us. We were addicts then, but we never admitted to being addicts. Addiction happened to others, not us, we thought. 

You may think that all we did was drink. No, we dedicated some time to thinking about drinking. Sometimes we worked, a terribly inconvenient way to get money as opposed to being politicians' children. Besides, we were (still are) afraid of jail. 

It happened that the lady with balls was also an early drinker. She had an accomplice, a man. He talked recklessly about politics as if he was a man of great importance. We deduced later that he probably was a political operative sent to listen to the 'ground.' He pried. He prodded trying to elicit some political response from us. We kept quiet. Sometimes, when you are drinking in the morning, all you need is silence. 

He talked in English. He thought we were foreigners. Damn. We looked like foreigners. We kept quiet as if politics was something way beyond our grasp. As we ruminated, the lady with balls emerged from the bathroom. The smell of cigarette wafted through. We never cared too much although there was a distinct notice that forbade smoking inside the bar. The owner reprimanded her. 

It turned out that she hadn't been alone in the toilet, smoking. There was a man, a known local who fell on hard times due to addiction. He wasn't like us, we could never drink until we lose jobs. Such abominable things happen to others, not us. We sipped our beers to that.

When cornered, the lady pulled the woman card. She claimed that the owner of the bar was targeting her because she was a woman. As if the warning addressed women only, and not all women but her specifically. We watched quietly as she rumbled on and on about the unfairness of the notice against smoking. We'd never seen someone defend their right to smoke their way to lung cancer. We didn't intervene, nor interject at all. It was her against the sign. Which was pretty clear to us. 

She went further to claim that the bar wasn't even his, that he was riding on a woman's (a Woman like her who deserves to smoke where there's a sign prohibiting smoking) benovelence. That he was nothing without her. That without her he wouldn't be able to talk to her against ruining her lungs that belonged to a woman. And then she began attacking his manhood. At this point the man realized that she had stooped so low that his presence there was no longer required. How things can descend from smoking to manhood is a matter that baffled us. Secretly, we were glad our manhood wasn't under scrutiny although it should have. 

"I have more balls than you," she said laughing at her seemingly ingenious thought. "You only have two while I have thousands." She spoke with such conviction that you could have thought she was capable of impregnating a man.

She talked by herself sometimes supported by her colleague. She had so much to unpack, as though she was waiting for that precise moment. It's unfortunate that some drink while angling for a fight or confrontation. It's worse when it's a woman because, well, there's no reason to hit a Woman. 

Eventually she cooled down. The conversation tapered to some random irrelevant topics. However, there was only one question in our heads, which balls was she re

ferring to?

It Happens

 It happens, 

almost always, 

as though don't coax it, 

without silence

with lack of resolve, 

eventually we end up 

being the very people we loath 

we are okay doing nothing 

just dreaming those big dreams 

How Do I Miss You

I don't know how to miss you,

I have tried but I can't, 

I guess longing for you needs a manual, 

an how-to, 

it somehow feels as though it can't be 

a DIY project,

there's a science to missing you, 

and I am an ancient man, 

a man who tells time by the sun's position, 

and years by crop harvest, 

seasons by locust invasions, 

for that I am duly lost, disillusioned in my longing, 

probably undue, 

I don't know whether we'll ever meet again, 

I have reserved my missing you,

were it possible, 

I'd pack the precious little moments 

we shared, 

the brief love, 

the laughter, that often felt as though it was stolen, 

and store somewhere, 

somewhere I'd reach occasionally, 

to gaze and remember to miss you 

just for a second. 

for a brief vain moment. 

The Drunk

when you no longer exist, 

in anyone's plans, 

its you alone, in your decrepit hacienda, 

rolling tobacco on obituary section of old 

newspapers, 

you are like a shadow, present 

but never missed 

mulling, 

ruminating, 

meditating, 

you no longer dream

beyond your next tipple, 

it's over for you

it was over a long time ago 

The Silence

 The silence, 

the borrowed silence, 

as if we are tiptoeing 

around each other, 

one numb, 

the other uncaring, 

the haunting silence, 

the silence of a machete,

and a shovel 

The Interloper

I am alone, 

an interloper 

in a place I should call 

home, 

the stench that wafts 

after me is failure, 

I am an intruder, 

stalking,

walking around unseen, 

I am of little use, 

sitting by boulders

in unseen corners, 

trying to be invisible, 

I am not welcome in 

spaces where men have 

opinions, 

for I, an interloper, 

has not more sense 

than cow dung