Poem and illustration by Beth Restrick
Poems Standard
Echo
bright splashes of sound and smell laugh
in my face as I drag
a finger through the dusty residue of last night’s
dreams
thoughts reaching eagerly for the edge of our windowsill
voices ring through my sister’s room and
small feet
chase the goats of Rue 3
I stick out my tongue because the air
is warm and salty and I
am glad to be alive
my feet find their way to the kitchen
and I smile up at a dripping face
“here”
I wriggle my hips into the skirt held out for me
stiff
with the sun and wind of Harmattan
the trucks begin to arrive
shouting hello to the watchman and we run
bare feet slapping across the cement, skidding
to a stop in the sudden sand
as I sneak a look behind me
before ducking through the doors
whip the willow
is new for us but the music
is already in our veins
so we listen our way into the patterns on the floor
rhythm
pulling the room in dizzy circles
lock elbows and spin faster
crooked
grin
we could dance
all night
later
the roof is a breathless
purple
leaning out over the courtyard, the moon
is nowhere to be found
quiet footsteps
pad on the stairs
I turn around and you point
so we look up at the sky and
pick a star to wish on
…
an alarm clock rings in the distance
my eyes fly open
groping for the mosquito net
and I turn my face towards the window, but there’s a wall
instead
confused snow
drifting quietly
to the ground outside
a new window
over there
I am lost and this must be
Minnesota
by Kekelime
Poems Standard
Lens
my memories, they are not of Ethiolo
of small feet winding
down a dusty path to a water-well worn
with the chatter of women, girls I used to know
I can’t see the dirt, red against your ankles
hear the call of buckets to one another
sloshing in the sway of hips
flip flops mingled in the early morning light
I remember knives flying
tongues sliding
across the smooth expanse of the language we shared
stretched through our fingers as peppers danced, green
into your pan
the screech of a wheelbarrow
bare feet slapped
across the bricks, padded
through the sand
I remember
sticky heat, and
breeze through my hair
waves lapping
against a shore that curves into the distance
lost blue in a city sky
by Kekelime
Poems Standard
They Say Africa
They say Africa is
A permanent thing,
That you can leave it behind but
It won’t leave
You behind
I don’t know if that’s true
They say Africa is
Always accepting,
Open-armed to welcome
Even the ones who’ve been gone
The longest
I don’t know if that’s true
They say Africa is
Undeniable in your blood,
That it cannot be forgotten,
That children of Africa
Can only grow up to be Africans
No matter how life goes
I was a child of Africa.
The language is slow on my tongue now,
And culture comes hesitantly, in bursts
Of memory that are ashamed of their weakness
In the safety of my home I am still
African but outside I have forgotten it all…
Africa, you promised to be permanent!
Africa, I promised to be always yours,
With the red dust of the village running
Through my veins until I die but
Memory is hard.
They say Africa is
Permanent, that it
Will not forget you even if
You cannot remember but
I guess skin colour was always
The dividing line.
by Ghanaperu
Poems Standard
For Africa
It is time now
To write
All the words I have been saving up
For such a time as this
I didn’t know they were there until now, but
It’s time
I would have thought that
This would be
A poem of an African,
A heart mired in the dark continent
Writing with all the pent-up longing
Of a people suppressed
But
It’s not.
There are those who write about Africa
From without,
Gathering together the images of starvation
And poverty and beauty to
Present us with a people of natural savagery
I am not like them.
There are those who write of Africa
From within, breathing
Out the dusty promise of better
Things to come for those who hold onto
Native pride
I am not like them.
I am writing of Africa
As a denizen, a foreigner who has seen.
Africa has made me who I am and when
I close my eyes I can still see Vli Falls misting on the
Mountain and Da Vise squinting up at the sky looking
For rain and Asigame in a cacophony of noise
Surrounding me.
Those things will never be lost.
But
I don’t belong there
Anymore
So I would have always thought
This poem would be
Written in the heart of an African
But I am five years away now and
I have discovered my blood runs red
Rather than Ghanaian.
I’m a citizen of the world and I can’t
Be constrained to any singular land
So
This is a poem to say
Africa, I am always yours but never
Yours alone
And I’m sorry.
Will you take my words
All the same?
I want to say
Thank you
Thank you to the bright blue sky at
Mr. Gold’s house and the grey-blue of Helekpe
Thank you to the green carpet grass of the
Coca-cola house in Ho and
Thank you to the green walls at Efo Dela’s house
Thank you to orange sunsets above a red dirt road
And pink sunrises driving through Pilo Town
Thank you to grey toll tickets and yellow
MTN buildings, to purple kente cloth and
Black mud.
Thank you to the colours of Africa that shine
Dusty and vibrant to weave a pattern through
All of childhood…though I crossed continents
The airport always had white tile floors when I
Returned and I
Counted on that
So in my dreams the line of dancers stomp
Their feet through the dust
With coloured cloths and white handkerchiefs
Swinging and I
Know all the words to the songs
Because the rhythm of the drums
Is my heartbeat
Africa, I will always be yours
I promise
by Ghanaperu
Poems Standard
White Sand, White Skin, and African Friends
There was sand beneath
my feet, between my fingers,
slipping down through my hair,
dusting across my face.
She screamed, laughed,
danced frantically away from
the edge of the sea-salt,
terrified of the vast unknown.
Afterwards, we sat in the
breeze and slurped warm
soda, dragging our fingers
through the sand on the
wooden bench, pretending
we both belonged there; but
I was the only one who burned.
Years later, I stood at the edge
of the eternal sea, watched the
sun set, sliding beneath the water.
I imagined riding a boat, sailing
six thousand miles to the other
edge, leaping off and finding her
still there, laughing hysterically.
It is always me
and only me
who burns –
my skin, my friends
my history, my
everything
by Ghanaperu