Major inJostice
I followed an English rose to the
gates of the Sahel -
I thought I knew I loved her; I was
young and couldn’t tell.
......all so long ago now, I don’t
recall that well.
Enchanting child seductress, she
sent my heart a’skip,
she never held much back and
offered cupid’s lips
.......but most of the attraction was
the chance to make that trip.
For one more lunar cycle I was
flown back to my Xen,
a place like I remember when I
was only 10;
.......Jos– just like Kabala, up–
country way back when.
There I met her father. I thought
he had no class -
full of british bullshit, weighed
down with his brass,
.......a Major in the army - more
like a major arse.
Stifling market plateau heat,
calico robes and levi strides,
camel traders side by side with
chinese toys and rayban’d eyes.
........he sent his 'boys’ to watch
our backs, amid the hubbub and
the flies.
To my shame, I since forgot the
names that walked with us,
from dawn til dusk - like mad
dogs, with coats of laterite dust.
.........but I saw his darling’s life, to
their care, he did entrust.
With parchment throat from
laughing, with these men of Niger’
mirth
I said - “Please come inside” this
mans house to quench our thirsts
.........but little did I know, to them
that was a first.
Cricket gossips mocked the silent
moment of surreal torpor,
The major glared with strange
confusion - first at me and then
his daughter.
.........and from the corner of my
eye, I caught her...
Looking at me like I was
demented - as if my pulse should
be felt,
in her pert chest, the same cold
void, as in her sire dwelt -
..........frigid hearts in sultry heat
stood hollow hard, refused to
melt.
...about a visit to Jos, Northern Nigeria in '86
Kabala is a town in the North of Sierra Leone
I didn't marry her....!
