WAITING CAN ALSO BE AN ACTIVE PROCESS

Lake Kariba










PATIENCE AND POWER

Last year we sat for hours, waiting for fuel;
Masvingo, Mutare, Harare. Kariba,
Each station closed, the forecourts teeming
With quiet men, waiting like hunters, missing nothing.

Young men, waiting for a bite on the line, a call,
A sign from the distant dust, a white pick-up, a nod
And we follow them into the wild, across tracks in the bush,
To driveways where the prey waits; drums, hidden under shelter.

Sometimes real money changed hands, the notes plentiful enough;
Sometimes coupons, bought abroad by electronic hunters.
Always the waiting, nothing happens here without a queue.
Young vendors hiss their distractions; ices, sweets, raw carrots.

Now, with fuel in the tank but still waiting, we are hunters,
Scanning the political landscape for signs of climate change.
Our elders, urging patience and forbearance, offer supplications,
To ancestors revered, remembered for patience, and for power.




Copyright Madresicilia2008

CLEFT PALATE SURGERY HARARE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL 6 APRIL 2008

A YOUNG GIRL’S HOPE

Doctors have repaired my broken from birth face,
Joined bones across the great divide that was my mouth.
I am bleeding, cut and pasted to a final edit;
Someone has promised me a mirror.

I am a passenger in the Nissan Patrol.
In the back row, my mother’s arms around me,
I sleep away the pain that is my face,
Dream of sisters and brothers similarly broken.

Back home they will stare and ask questions
About the journey, the hospital, the surgeon’s knife.
I might not want to tell them. I might not like
Their attention, stealing memories from my cut and paste lips.

I never knew Hope before; she did not visit our huts.
Now I look at my shoes, stroke my knees beneath this cotton dress
And hope that I will be allowed to keep them. Hope
That my face will stop hurting, that I will smile like my teacher.

Copyright Madresicilia2008

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