January 27, 2008
Bat
Here is a Fulani poem about bats:
Wilwindu semtini pooli
Alla semtin dum
Sabu bilan koyde de jumnita hoore
Walaa leebi nguuri ina piira
Oh bat, you are the shame of all birds!
God himself has shamed you
You swing by your feet and hang your head down
You've got no feathers and you fly by your skin.
Posted by sahelsteve at 11:28 AM
August 05, 2007
Fish Ladder
I wrote this poem for Mum's birthday. It's about the fish ladder in Pitlochry, which she visited as a child and which Charlie and I visited on honeymoon.
Posted by sahelsteve at 11:12 PM
February 01, 2005
Why I love Africa
I love the grin of a sheep when it is on the front of a motorbike and its lips are flapping in the wind,
The chaos of the market and the stillness of the desert and the short walk in between,
The syncopated thuds of a thousand poles and mortars,
Uninhibited laughter.
I love the feel of hot millet paste in the palm,
The moments just before sunset when earthen huts turn to gold,
The silhouette of a cow's horns against the moonlit sky,
Bright stars and the rage of the mosquito outside my net.
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:11 PM
August 26, 2004
haiku #20
moonlit dune
a lone donkey
gazing at Pleides
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:44 AM
August 24, 2004
haiku #19
on the warm brown skin
of a djembe drum
a gecko blinks
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:16 AM
haiku #18
a firefinch alights
on a dry thatched roof
sahara dawn
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:14 AM
haiku #17
the sound of raindrops
and ecstatic croaking
of unseen frogs
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:13 AM
haiku #16
in dark glasses
and swathes of indigo
the chief ventures out
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:12 AM
haiku #15
horns of a cow
black crescents silhouetted
on an orange sky
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:10 AM
haiku #14
bowing low
I see ants on a peanut shell
sallifana prayer
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:08 AM
August 14, 2004
haiku #13
desert before dawn
aquarius is waning
allahu akbar
Posted by sahelsteve at 07:37 AM
August 13, 2004
haiku #12
shepherd's staff
and golden breadfruit
falling together
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:05 PM
haiku #11
grain in the mortar
she chooses a pounding song
evening descends
Posted by sahelsteve at 09:48 AM
August 12, 2004
haiku #10
launching off bare stalks
the locusts are leaving town;
harvest came early
Update: Read my appeal in the wake of the locust swarms.
Posted by sahelsteve at 09:31 PM
haiku #9
through shimmering heat
grinning goats approach
a dry watering hole
Posted by sahelsteve at 09:29 PM
haiku #8
stumbling onwards
a tear glistens in her eye
in her hooves gravel
Posted by sahelsteve at 10:37 AM
haiku #7
african morning
vultures gather on the roof
someone sobs
Posted by sahelsteve at 10:34 AM
haiku #6
river-blind toddler
imagining whiskered fish
gropes in a puddle
Posted by sahelsteve at 10:31 AM
haiku #5
african sunshine
pupils contract to a dot
it still hurts to look
Posted by sahelsteve at 10:30 AM
haiku #4
harmattan season
white calf too weak to stand up
darkness engulfs her
Posted by sahelsteve at 10:02 AM
August 11, 2004
haiku #3
a weeping sore
where his umbilical was;
baby is awake
Posted by sahelsteve at 08:00 AM
haiku #2
terrified children
daring each other to touch
the rain spider
Posted by sahelsteve at 07:58 AM
haiku #1
a circle of blood
where my knee touches the net
african sunrise
Posted by sahelsteve at 07:52 AM
July 12, 2004
Three Truths
(for Mum, 5 August 2004)
A hyena wandering in the bush
Did catch a young goat by its toe.
“Salaam Aleykum, Goat,” laughed he,
“Give me three truths and I'll let you go.”
“Aleykum athalaam,” said Goat
“I think I've got the firth thing:
If you were truly ravenouth
We wouldn't be converthing.”
“Extremely good,” Hyena laughed,
“I like your ready caprine wit,
But if you do not add two truths
You'll watch the sunset from a spit.”
“When you get home tonight,” said Goat
“And tell your kin the thtory,
They won't believe you met me here
Unleth the endingth gory.”
Hyena clapped his horny hands,
“Al Hamdilillalay,” he cried.
“Now just one truth to go, my friend,
You might still save your smelly hide.”
“Give me a thecond,” said the goat.
I know I'm going to get it -
Ah, yeth! - if you releath me now,
You'll thertainly regret it.”
“I won't deny,” Hyena laughed,
“I want to roast you to a crisp.
But you have spoken truth – go forth,
And madden others with your lisp.”
Lippety-clippety, off Goat ran,
But at dusk the smell still lingered,
Hyena moaned, “How could I let
Hors d'oevre slip through my fingers?”
And so, enraged by hunger pangs,
Hyena went in hot pursuit.
But Goat, he knew the desert well,
And chose a labyrinthine route.
“At Tinnakof Hyena fell,
He'd had a three-day run,
And to thith day his boneth are there,
A-laughing in the thun.”
Posted by sahelsteve at 03:55 PM
October 30, 2003
The Seeker
A seeker in an ancient desert land,
Determined to discover and lay bare
All nature's secrets, met a holy man
Renowned for wisdom, said, “Please tell me where
Your knowledge ends; I aim to understand
What lies beyond your dim myopic stare.”
The hermit's bony shoulders shook with mirth;
He said, “I've never seen an ass give birth.”
The seeker scoffed, continued on his way
And found a pregnant ass on which to prove
Man's greatness; he resolved that come what may
He'd follow her: “Forgive me, donkey, you've
Got company. I'll track you night and day
Until the birth; I'll match your every move.”
The ass led northward, placid and resigned.
The seeker trotted earnestly behind.
He followed past exotic trees whose rare
Delicious fruits hung low along the track,
Ignored the smooth dark skin and shining hair
Of maidens beckoning from bivouacs.
He met a wild-eyed boy who wailed, “Beware
The dancing demons of the north - turn back!”
Yet neither fear nor lust nor greed could wrest
The seeker from his donkey-trekking quest.
Three days the donkey wandered, then at last
Lay panting on a dune; with deep delight
The seeker watched the beast, till sudden blast
Of wind and stinging sand obscured his sight
And made him cringe and stagger - when it passed
A scrawny foal lay blinking in the light.
Marvel at nature's intricate design,
Be humble, lest your hunt be asinine.
Posted by sahelsteve at 04:03 PM
August 12, 2003
The Mine of Dreams
I watch the miners toil at Mondé So,
That desert bowl a colander of hope.
Harouna's dust-eyed brother hauls a rope;
I hear a questing pickaxe far below.
A many-braided girl in yellow skirt
Supports Harouna's son in dorsal fold,
Sings low and pours some water through some dirt,
with swaying hips and pan and would-be gold.
Here he comes, blinking, up into the light,
His crusty camel snorts derisively,
We greet, we bless, he rinses off the white,
Surveys the other miners pensively.
Harouna's words will echo in my sleep:
"To find the gold you have to travel deep."
Posted by sahelsteve at 04:01 PM
April 12, 2003
Liver
She brought her children and her hollow cheeks
All the way from Mali on two legs.
Helen bought her some liver, I hear,
from round the corner, a few pence worth -
Some for today, some for tomorrow.
Liver,
For now.
Posted by sahelsteve at 03:56 PM
February 10, 2003
The Blind Blacksmith
The blacksmith sits cross-legged on the ground
Formidable he strikes the iron band -
He feels his sinews tauten as he pounds
And shapes a permanence with skillful hand.
In wordless conversation with his Muse
he turns the fillament in glowing tongs,
then, marshalling his force, again renews
the heavy mallet's adamantine song.
No heavy heart those savage blows betray
no secret pain or furious desire,
How tenderly his calloussed hands survey
The product of his competence and fire.
This squatting potentate with eyes unseeing
Has wrought Potential into perfect Being.
Posted by sahelsteve at 03:59 PM
January 23, 2003
Wind of God
Three weeks without rain.
The thirsty almost-millet stood
Upright in a thousand fields,
Brittle and apprehensive in the sun.
On Tuesday morning we prayed for rain,
We knelt, bowing our foreheads to the ground.
Then we got up and ate,
Watched a red cloud approaching.
On Tuesday afternoon the wind struck.
I sat inside and clouds of dust
Blew in under the door; I was concerned
Because my books would get dusty.
Outside in fields near and far away
Slender stalks of almost-millet knelt,
Bowing their heads to the ground.
La ilaha illa Alla.
Breathless messengers arrived in town,
Small boys still blinking dust:
"A mighty wind blew in from the desert it struck the four corners of our field the millet has collapsed it is dead."
Wednesday was very quiet.
On Thursday, market day,
You visited and I couldn't not ask:
"Noy ngesa maa?" How is your field?
"Fuu na boni. Al hamdilillalay."
You pronounced each word
Carefully and dispassionately.
All is ruined. Praise God.
In our silence I heard other voices
Passing nearby and far away,
Repeating to each other without irony,
"Fuu na boni. Al hamdilillalay."
Next year a thousand families
Will struggle to survive.
I went inside, opened a dusty book,
Began to read unhappily.
Posted by sahelsteve at 03:54 PM
October 12, 2002
A Week on Lariam
to the tune of The Gasman Cometh (Flanders and Swan)
Twas on the Monday morning I took my mefloquine,
My hands began to tremble and my head began to spin,
My legs got pins and needles, all my friends were most amused,
And I went straight back to bed, feeling anxious and confused.
Twas on the Tuesday morning the vertigo arrived,
I staggered and I stumbled but somehow I survived,
My co-ordination problems made me feel such a twit,
But they were just precursors to an epileptic fit.
Twas on the Wednesday morning that I awoke in tears,
With visual disturbances and ringing in the ears,
My scalp had started itching which gave me quite a scare -
So I scratched it uncontrollably, and out fell all my hair!
Twas on the Thursday morning the fever came along,
With chills and cramps and muscle pains I wondered what was wrong,
With my enzymes all excited and my blood cells on the blink
I was panicky and nervous and couldn't sleep a wink.
Twas on the Friday morning the paranoia struck,
Everyone was after me, my time was nearly up,
I locked myself inside my room, and that allayed my fear -
But then I felt the rumblings of impending diarrhoea.
On Saturday and Sunday forgetfulness set in -
So it was on the Monday morning I took more mefloquine...