In The Dawn Of Great Tomorrows

In those desperate days
when fires consumed brotherhood

In those days when words stung
and passions were not of love or romance

In those days when fear seared
the hearts of men and children alike

When the smell of blood
hung in our throats like yesterday’s bilious food

When we ceased to feel the chill of the night
or the hot rays of the afternoon sun

In those dark and frightening days
When silence was golden, I spoke to all and sundry

I spoke to those who didn’t care to listen
those who were brainwashed or just plain beaten

I spoke of the lies we had been fed
and how we were being led to destroy the country we built

I spoke of the promises never met; schools,
hospitals, and roads yet to be built

I spoke of Njoroge, Kiprono and Otieno,
who lived happily together in Korogocho

I spoke of dairy and fish farming,
of the once fresh vegetables left to rot

I spoke of the shops that were burning
Where would Anyango go to work tomorrow?

I spoke of the innocent children
Who would look after them if we killed our neighbour?

I spoke of the future
Would we forever hide the blood that stained our hands?

I spoke of calm and peace
Who would still these fires that lit the night?

I spoke of peace, love and hope

PoP © 15 Jan 2008

A Song Of Hope

It's in our hands that freedom,
hope and justice lie.
It's in our hearts, the bond
that's united us all our lives.
It's Kenyan blood that dearly paid
for unity, peace, and liberty.
We won't let greed control
justice and freedom,
We will not accept to live in fear.
We will not let the power hungry dogs
feed on the cord that binds.
We will not let them spit
in the blood we shed.
We won't let gluttony
split the nationalities
pitting brother against brother.

Kenya will be Kenya again
Her grass will not stain
with her own blood
Peace will reign again
Kenya will stand united
Kenya will stand strong
proud and tall again

PoP 14 Jan 08

Careful... Careful What You Say

Shall we talk about our words... and how we get to a place called abuse? It all starts with a thought that tells you that you are more educated/religious/intelligent/clean/loving/faithful than the next guy.

How then does it escalate to uncontrollable levels?
From every thought comes an action - either in your control, or not. The action may come before a word or statement.

To abuse another is to fulfil a sense of inadequacy in oneself, to lunge out to some innocent party instead of working on oneself. It is a great weakness we have. Abuse is like a roller coaster that starts slowly and gathers momentum as it goes.

My ex started abusing me by saying innocent sounding things like 'You are smart but....'. 'You will not be able to get that because you're too'. 'You are not that intelligent despite your education', etc. 'The shoes are nice but your feet are too...'. At first I took it in good faith, working on the issues he mentioned, trying to improve, improve, improve - even on the wonderful things that I had cherished before I met him. Wonderful gifts that God had so graciously given me.

The roller coaster moved a notch and before I knew it, he was on his knees crying for forgiveness after slapping me around. I forgave him and went on 'improving'.

With time, the roller coaster was in full swing, and the real beatings started; slaps and a punch here and there. Before I knew it he went all out to beating me and my kids like he was killing a poisonus snake. No punch or kick was too hard for him. During those times, he was enraged and wild. Neighbours, relatives and friends could not calm him down until his steam was spent on us.

But I digress....

My message here is be careful what you say. There are things that hurt - like telling the blind man how ugly he is, or insulting the cripple for his disability. The things that hurt the most are things that are personal and can not be changed, like tribe and skin colour. Things that can not be washed off like warts, that one can not afford to have removed or like stained teeth that cannot, for one reason or another, be bleached. Things like poverty that can not be immediately resolved, or disability. Issues like religion that can be discussed but not imposed, or personal beliefs that don't really hurt you or anyone else. These are personal things; personal to each individual. If we remember that, we keep the peace. Remember also, that God created each and everyone unique in His eyes, to add on to the beauty of earth. Live and let live.

Some things are actually much better left unthought. Harness your thoughts, and immediately something comes into your mind that is destructive, replace that thought with a pleasant, positive one. Live and let live. And if you live with someone whose unchangeable habits really irritate you, please leave. Yes, I mean, LEAVE.

Abuse starts with a thought, escalates to a word and explodes in an action. The word may seem so innocent at the time, but it leaves the other party unhappy and insulted even if they pretend it's all ok - it leaves the other person vulnerable. For example, a negative comment to a spouse of a sexual nature can leave him/her unable to perform, maybe even destroying a marriage irreparably. An abuser will always add another veiled insult as the abused gets more vulnerable. That is what sets off the roller coaster ride.

Be careful what you say. The tongue can light a fire that destroys a lifetime of good. It starts with us in our individual capacity, goes to our homes, and moves with the stealth of a thief in the night to our country.

Be careful...
PoP

A Response To Sue

(Sue is a Kenyan in the Diaspora - she's hopelessly worried about her family who live in Molo and are now displaced. This is part of our correspondence).

Hi Sue,

We are well.

Yes, things are cooling down. Our country has taken a hit! Our people are afraid; we have been tainted by the reality of negativity and tribalism. We have been shown what it feels like to be separated, torn apart; and it hurts, it really hurts. We have seen what happens when everybody insists they are right and the other is wrong, when we are the helpless victims of a class dictating their whims. When a power fight is in our land and we are the grass. We have had a glimpse of genocide, we have taken a step into Rwanda - our country has had no sleep!

We hope that justice will be served. Kenyans will not live with the injustice of being lied to, but most important of all, Kenya will not live in fear, desolation and death. These two parties have to find a way to an understanding that does not hurt the masses. Kenya remains greater than the sum of them and more!

Yes, houses have been razed. 300,000 people are homeless. I cry for the Kenyans who are homeless in their own land. I cry for the bitterness in our people, our children, and our children's children. I cry for these dark days when our livelihoods were snatched from us, our children killed, our kinship with our neighbours erased. I cry for the children who are in the cold, their hopes dashed, their innocence shattered. And the women and men who are raped and hunted, walking to nowhere in the dark, afraid to look in their neighbour's eye. I cry for Kenya and her people, who continue to be raped time and again by the ruling class.

I noticed, as life gets back to a semblance of normalcy, that even in the workplace, things have shifted. Everyone is afraid of uttering the words Kikuyu, Luo, Masai, Kalenjin, etc. It's like walking on eggs! These are our tribes/nationalities for which we have always stood proud and tall; these are our people who we have embraced, celebrated with, cried with, intermarried with. These are the people who now look at each other with suspicion, even disdain, as if one is only identifiable in the stealing of votes, the looting, the killings, the evictions and bloodshed. Our ties are slowly being eroded by the violence. Everyone is agape at the shocking change in nature of a people who have always lived together. Most of us are shamed; left to hold our heads in our hands and cry. What happened? Has this been simmering all along? All our tribal jokes, emails and sms; all those hard hitting tribal sms throwing mud at other tribes/nationalities that were passed around during the campaigns. This is the result. Yes, they have contributed to the violence.

I'm tired, my dear friend. All I can do is pray that the people heal. Right now, I'm not interested in who becomes president - I'm not sure I've ever been. Until we get a president who is a servant of the people, until we attain a true democracy, we will be exchanging one thief/liar for another.

All I can do is pray; pray for love, peace, and justice. That is my prayer - love, peace and justice, in that order.

Love,
PoP

KENYA

Tears crawled down her proud cheeks
Soot stuck in her once pretty hair
No one noticed her weep
Footsteps whizzed by,
bullets puncture her side.
Angry fires burnt bright,
Elegant shops now were a sight,
people screamed in fright
Everyone fast on their heels
No one noticed her as she wept
No one stopped to hear speak
No one heard her say,
calm down,
Let justice and peace prevail
Calm down
No one heard Kenya speak

PoP 1 Jan 08

My Shepherd

Even
Though
I
Walk
Through
The
Valley
Of
The Shadow
of death
I will
fear NO evil
For You Are with me

Your rod and your staff
They comfort me

....an excerpt from my favourite.. Psalm 23

Pray for us.

PoP 1 Jan 08

Our House Is On Fire

Not Knowing
Where to run
In the shadow of street fires
And eyes that look
in yours with a mad desire
to kill

Not knowing
which way to turn
in the melee of screaming children
screeching tyres
tear gas loaded tears
resounding gunshots in the night

Which child to take?
Which one to leave?
Which hand do we hold?
Our house is on fire!
Our house is on fire!

PoP Jan 1 08

The Nature of Nurture

A neighbour’s dog recently broke my dog’s leg. To those out there who are in the dark about breaking of legs in the African context, this essentially means that some dog recently made my dog pregnant. I only realized this about two weeks before she got her puppies. Seven unplanned puppies of different colours came out of her one Thursday night in early November.

At first, she was very possessive and would not let us go within a few inches of her. She practically didn’t eat for the first two days, concentrating on her puppies, cleaning and nursing them. In the next two weeks, she got bolder, leaving them to go do whatever dogs do elsewhere. In the weeks that followed, she left the puppies more and more; sometimes just moving away to lie in the sun, at other times, walking off to the neighbouring houses or just lying outside the gate in wait for any family member coming back home.

Over the last few days, as we weaned the puppies, I noticed that our dog had become thinner. She wasn’t getting enough to eat as the pups would eat their share, and a bit of what she left for later, and still nurse. I also noticed something rather extraordinary; as she realized that her puppies were eating more, she started refusing to nurse them, and got very fierce when they approached her bowl of food.

This scenario reminds me of women in the role of wife and mother and teaches me a lesson I’d like to pass on. Many times, women take on the role the sacrificial lamb, morosely walking toward their own slaughter.

When there is little food, women eat last; their dreams, pleasures, desires, needs and wants are met last. Sometimes women are bitter at their husbands, children, and the world in general. Surprisingly, it is the women, who set these standards. We set the kind of relationship we want right from the commencement of each relationship, be it with our husbands, children, relatives or colleagues. Women have more control over family than they give themselves credit for.

Right from the time women begin a relationship with a prospective husband, we set the standards of respect expected and given, levels of importance of self, our career progression and path, how we will handle the in laws, relatives and children, etc. Think about it, it is all in our hands.

The lesson for me here is that there is no good in being a giver if one cannot be receiver. As women, we should remember to nurture ourselves first, emotionally, psychologically, physically and intellectually to be able to give these same traits to husbands, children, colleagues and others. You cannot give what you do not have.

Where Did They Go?

Where once there was peace
and love for your neighbour
Where once in less was abundance
for in sharing, even less was much

Where once the children were ours
None starved while others ate to their fill
And the youth too were ours,
moulded to a people with great self esteem

Where once the aged slept in warm beds
unafraid of unlived tomorrows
Where those who were sad
would not be let to drown in their sorrows

Where are those people who cared so?
Where are they whose footprints we followed?
Where are they whose words once were imprinted in our hearts?
Where have they gone?

PoP 13 Dec 07

Emotional Deposits & Withdrawals

Talking to a friend a few days ago, I had a revelation. I’ve known about this almost all my adult life, but once in a while moments arise where these things are perfectly illuminated. We talked about friends and family, and their generosity with advise.

Advise is one of the commodities one can get for free from people from all walks of life. For example, I have a close friend who introduced me to looking at spirituality from a totally non-conventional view. That advice has been well received by my hitherto restless spirit.

I, on the other hand love to talk to friends and colleagues about the importance of family. One would imagine that the non-existent Family Ties Promotion Agency is paying me very well to do this. I love family units, functional and non-functional. But I digress.

Our conversation went on to practicalities on reaping and sowing. Silence really did beget silence, and your smile is always reflected in the recipient’s face. It amazed the both of us how the advice we gave to others often came back to us through the very same people. For example, I have a friend who has practically built her life from scratch, with very little help from family and friends. Hearing her talk, one feels encouraged even in the worst situations. Sometimes though, she falters and we, to whom she has spoken, have to remind her where she has come from, and encourage her to walk on.

We should be careful to make as many positive deposits as we can, for we never know when we will need to make a substantive withdrawal.

(c)19 Nov 07

Leave Or Die

The first slap stung
slightly more than the veiled insults
sandwiched in bitter silences
The second slap months later was met with
barely veiled surprise.

His fist,
his heel,
the quiet crack of breaking bone.
She’s hit time and again by painfully pregnant words
She’s bloodied by looks and acts
dripping with criticism, sarcasm
and reduced to nothing by his nonchalant attitude

She can’t count her body’s aches and pains.
She can no longer even think straight.
She’s almost broken by the burden she bears
wondering how his anger became her load.

What was once hers is in his hands
Her confidence is so threadbare
she can’t meet her childrens’ eyes.
Day in day out, she’s abused,
played with and discarded like an angry child’s toy

Many times she packed up, then unpacked her bags
She has held her children’s hands,
walked out, walked right back in.
Today she’s determined to leave
Today, she leaves
Or
Today, she dies

akinyi © Nov 26 2007

Shall We Wage A Sex War?

The announcement recently made by President Kibaki that women would get three months maternity leave may be a step in the right direction, but it is still way below what Kenyan women deserve. For many women who have had to choose their jobs over their babies due to economic pressures, this announcement was pleasant, but came too late.

In the ongoing campaigns, very little has been said about issues directly affecting women. Neither ODM nor Charity Ngilu and The ‘Pentagon wives’ seem to be making any effort in pushing the women’s agenda, yet women are still the most marginalized and disempowered lot. President Kibaki’s PNU is quiet on women’s issues and does not seem to have a strong plan to handle the emancipation of women.

The call for affirmative action earlier in the year did not harness much support from the majority women, read workers, peasants, and hawkers. In fact, most of them did not even understand the concept of the action. Indeed it died a rather sudden death mainly because ruling class women who continually use the oppression of women as a stepping-stone to climb the socio-political ladder proposed it.

So it leaves us asking, who will fight for the rights of the majority women? Who will fight for the general labourers, mama mbogas, hawkers, peasants and fisherwomen? Who will articulate their issues on remuneration, maternity leave, childcare or working conditions? Who will fight for their rights to housing, land, medical care, inheritance and education?

So far, we have not seen any politicians go down to the grassroots to speak to the women on issues affecting them. LATF and CDF funds may sometimes trickle to organized women groups, but what happens to the major issues like decent housing, education, access to clean water, medical care and childcare. We all know that the quality of ‘free’ education offered by the government remains wanting.

Granted, the majority men; workers, hawkers and peasants are oppressed too. It is worthwhile to note that however oppressed a man may be, he has an outlet for his oppression. Many men still knowingly or unknowingly oppress their wives. Though both male and female workers are exploited at the work place, her husband will not hesitate to further dominate the worker woman. It’s not surprising then that with the rising cost of basic commodities, bus fares, and salaries that have remained static over the years; domestic violence has escalated. The woman is further stripped of her dignity and self worth.

So, shall we wage a war of the sexes or should we just curl up and die? Women and men must realize that we are complimentary to each another. A home where one partner is unhappy can never be a happy home. In order to win this war we must fight together side by side, each empowering the other as we struggle to overturn an exploitative system.

We need to organise the majority women so that as one, women can have an audible voice. In his speech commemorating International Women’s Day in Burkina Faso on March 8, 1987, Thomas Sankara said “The human being, this vast and complex combination of pain and joy, solitary and forsaken, yet creator of all humanity, suffering, frustrated and humiliated, and yet endless source of happiness for each one of us, this source of affection beyond compare, inspiring the most unexpected courage, this being called weak but possessing untold ability to inspire us to take the road of honour, this being of flesh and blood and of spiritual conviction – this being women, is you… We must restore to humanity your true image by making the reign of freedom prevail over differentiations imposed by nature and eliminating all kinds of hypocrisy that sustain the shameless exploitation of women.”

PoP 2 Nov 07

No-one Lives Here Anymore

Infatuated by the illusion of happiness
in a ghost city, where the scent of fear is familiar

Swishing by like a shadow walking through
a cloudless night

Sought in unfamiliar beds
musty in the aftermath of erotica

Arms flung in short-lived passion,
closed lips hungry in a bittersweet embrace

Lost in the curling smoke of a joint,
the amnesia of a drinking stupor

Temporarily satiated
Until the shadow’s hand falls upon your shoulder

PoP © 24 Oct 07

Rainbows in the Dew

whisper my name in the wind
rustling through the colourless flowers
quench my thirst in the morning dew
let your fleeting glance rest on me
with a touch of sunshine
unravel in purples, greens and blues
happiness, ensnare me in your youth

PoP © 24 Oct 07

Underneath the Sombre Expression

A scenario is given about a couple in their family car on their way to work. The man is concentrating on the road ahead, listening to the radio and making the occasional comment. The woman is serious and quiet, either staring straight ahead or browsing the newspaper. Her comments are few or even non-existent. Her expression seems almost hostile and unfriendly. This poem is for her.


Maybe it’s the early mornings
or late nights.

Or the mad rush to conclude
unfinished chores.

Maybe it’s the children
constantly demanding her attention.

Or the weight of responsibilities;
mother, friend, sister, daughter, wife.

Maybe it’s the dates she has to remember
doctor’s appointments, school visits, family weddings, the work calendar.

Or that she’s expected to smile
even when she’s sick or sad or tired.

Maybe she just needs some time
to catch her breath.

Or a precious moment
to put up her feet

Maybe it’s the thought
of attending yet another meeting, class or funeral.

Or the belief that she’s tireless
and can take anything that’s thrown at her regardless.

So she lives her life in constant fear
heart thudding in trepidation
on her face a hung-dog expression
or a permanent look of anticipation,
hoping someone will take the time to pay her a little attention.

PoP 5 Oct 07